


Rollercoaster

by rofawkes



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Best Friends, Drugs, Fluff, Graduation, High School, M/M, OT9 (EXO), Recreational Drug Use, Underage Drinking, chick flick and rom com references everywhere, dumb moments, minimal, pinning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-03
Updated: 2020-07-03
Packaged: 2021-03-04 19:08:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 44,555
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25041421
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rofawkes/pseuds/rofawkes
Summary: It's Senior Year of High School and what promised to be the best year of Baekhyun's life turned into a mess of unrequited crushes, best friends getting into relationships, crazy parties and teenage drama.orThe one where Kyungsoo just wants to be a good class president, Sehun has a newfound love for documentary, Jongin cries a lot, Chanyeol has a secret, Yixing has a girlfriend, Jongdae wants to remain un-problematic and Baekhyun thinks he might have anger issues.
Relationships: Byun Baekhyun/Park Chanyeol, Do Kyungsoo | D.O/Kim Jongin | Kai, and other crushes, unimportant straight ships
Comments: 44
Kudos: 164
Collections: The GraduaXion





	Rollercoaster

**Author's Note:**

> A playlist I made for the fic:
> 
> Rollercoaster — Bleachers  
> Sunflower — Rex Orange County  
> Hold My Liquor — Kanye West  
> Best Friend — Rex Orange County  
> Girl Crush — Harry Styles (cover)  
> These Days — Wallows  
> CPU — Raury ft. RZA  
> New Light — John Mayer  
> Talk Too Much — COINN  
> Stay Up — Baekhyun  
> Do I Wanna Know — Arctic Monkeys  
> Yours — Raiden, Chanyeol  
> Can I Call You Tonight — Dayglow  
> Get You — Daniel Caesar, Kali Uchis  
> Falling In Love — Cigarettes After Sex

Being the new kid in school is never easy. Specially after the period when groups have already formed into their own social cliques. If High School in itself is not really an easy valley to walk through, walking it alone is even harder.

Baekhyun’s first day of sophomore high school was probably the worst day of his life. 

His father dropped him off right at the entrance of the school in his patrol car and, of course, everyone turned to see the new kid, the new face, who was probably a convicted criminal. He was late for three of his classes because he couldn’t find any of his classrooms. 

Everyone stared at him as he walked through the halls. He supposes he brought that on himself—being the new kid who made a perfect entrance in his bubblegum pink hair and who corrected the biology teacher _twice_ in the first period alone. He just couldn’t keep his mouth shut. 

Everything was fucking horrible. He stuck out like a sore thumb.

He is sitting in the cafeteria, well aware of the constant whispers and pitying looks he received from the rest of his classmates as he sat alone on, playing around with the rice and meat in his plate, hunger gone.

But then, the unexpected happened and someone was pulling the chair right in front of him-

“Hello” a soft voice said. Baekhyun looked up to see the kindest smile he has ever seen on a face and his world stopped for a second.

And they say love at first sight was not a thing. 

“Hi,” he said shyly.

“I’m Yixing.” 

“Baekhyun.” he offered and when Yixing smiled, Baekhyun thought the dimple that appeared on his cheek was the cutest thing in the universe.

“I see you’re new here. Would you like to sit with us?”

Baekhyun’s brain stuttered for a second. If this were a movie, this would be the meet-cute moment where the oblivious protagonist meets the love of their life, saving him from the despair of being the lonely new kid.

He turns to look at the table next to him— there were seven other boys in there. One of them was sleeping with his head resting on his hand, before another guy suddenly moves his hand and makes him fall, earning unanimous laughter. A shorter was giving a death glare to the prosecutor of the prank, a tall boy with prominent ears… who smiles brightly upon feeling Baekhyun’s gaze on him. They all looked at him, motioning for him to come and join.

That was the start of it all.

They welcomed him into Yixing’s group and Baekhyun had never been more thankful for something in his life. He never thought he’d find a group of friends he’d be so close to and so happy with in such a short time. He fit so easily into their dynamics that it felt like they’ve known each other their whole lives. 

Jongdae was a an innuendo expert and Baekhyun mended with him right away. He was afraid of Kyungsoo at first what since the boy was always giving him killer glares and stepping on everyone like a stern mom to keep them in line, but he often could see him laughing along and trying to hide his cheeky side and warmed up to him. Then there was big and lanky Chanyeol, polar opposite to Baekhyun’s short and soft frame, but who fit with him like the long lost piece of a puzzle. The taller even once said that there was a bond linking them together and Baekhyun believed so too.

He found himself getting attached to everyone quickly. They spent two years together as the infamous group in the school, but sadly, two of them had to move in onto the next step of their lives. He quietly teared up when Minseok and Junmyeon graduated last semester but smiled at their promise of coming to visit often.

It was also very easy, Baekhyun discovered, to fall in love with Zhang Yixing. What started as a simple crush on the Chinese boy quickly developed into literally every thought inside Baekhyun’s mind. Yixing very kind-, the kindest person he'd ever met besides his own mother. He was naturally funny, he always cared for Baekhyun —he was prince savior that very first day— and he was incredibly handsome. 

For a year and a half, Baekhyun settled for Yixing’s friendship, enjoying his company and suffering in silence. But this year, he was tired of pining. _This year_ was going to be Baekhyun’s year. 

It was senior year, the last stage of high school before college and _the boring adult life_ , so Baekhyun was determined to make this year the best of his life.

And that started with confessing his never-ending love to Yixing.

He felt the excitement running through his veins. With his now natural brown hair—at the request of his mother who feared he was going to be bald before even finishing puberty—he adjusted the straps of his backpack as he waited for Chanyeol to pick him up and start his _last_ first day of high school.

He watched the black crossfox pull in front of him, opened the door and greeted the driver livelily with a big wide smile.

“Good morning, Yeol!” The other only responded with a grunt.

Chanyeol shot him a strange look. His face was still a bit puffy from sleep and he had a cap on, which meant that he didn’t even bother to brush his hair this morning.

“What’s up with you?” he asked, handing Baekhyun his coffee- black, iced, with hazelnut syrup. like he did every morning. He never asked for payback, but Baekhyun brought him home-baked goodies whenever he could.

“Chanyeol, it’s the beginning of the end. Aren’t you excited?” 

The other boy just shrugged, unbothered. 

“I have great plans this year,” he said dreamily, taking a sip of his coffee through the straw.

“Is one of those plans finally confessing to Yixing?” 

Baekhyun choked on his coffee.

“Hey!” Chanyeol complained as he cleaned the glove box with the sleeve of his black hoodie while still driving.

“H-How did you know that?” he stammered.

“ _Wait,_ that means you’re actually doing it?”

“I-I don’t— wha— how— _no._ ”

“Great, Baekhyun. He’ll fall right at your feet.” he teased.

“How did you know? It was supposed to be a secret!” the shorter boy whined and slumped back into his seat.

“Come one, man, I’ve been watching you making heart eyes at Yixing for the entire past year”

Baekhyun pouted. “I haven’t” he lied. 

Looking outside the window, he noticed they were already approaching the school. “Aren’t we picking Sehun up?”

“Nah” Chanyeol explained, focusing his attention on trying to find a parking spot. “He texted me very early saying he got another ride”

“There’s a spot in the far left—with whom?”

“Don’t know, didn’t ask.”

They got off the car and walked through the parking lot. It was like a zoo, but Baekhyun guessed it was expected for the first day of senior year—and the whole high school experience in general. He’d come with the idea of walking towards the entrance, pretending to have his slow-camera moment like the beginning of a teen movie. However, now that Chanyeol had commented on the whole Yixing thing, he felt a lot less chirpy than when he woke up. The taller boy seemed to notice too, as he kept throwing glances at him.

“Are you okay?— What happened to the ‘ _woo last first day_ ’ or whatever?” he asked, moving his hands up excitedly in a mocking manner.

“Nothing.”

“Baek…”

“It’s just— do you think Yixing knows?”

Chanyeol scoffed. “No. You’ll probably have to slap Yixing on the face with your dick and then _maybe_ he’ll get the hint that you have the hots for him.”

“First of all, gross.” Baekhyun started. “Second of all, I don’t just _have the hots_ for him. He’s my first love. It’s important.”

Chanyeol rolled his eyes and threw an arm across Baekhyun’s shoulders, pulling him closer while they walked. “Whatever, Yixing is as dumb as a rock.”

“Okay, third of all, Yixing’s not dumb. He is _special_ , too good for this world, too pure— what the fuck?”

There was a screeching sound of wheels scraping the pavement forcefully. Other students noticed too and were hoarding on the sidewalk.

Jongdae, was walking towards them with a grin but stopped in his tracks when he saw the looks on his friend’s faces. Once he reached them, he followed Baekhyun’s gaze. 

“ _Jesus christ_ ” he hissed. 

Just as they were reaching the entrance, a black Audi sped through the parking lot, swaying very dangerously through the mass of students before parking a few spots away from the entrance.

“Damn, how did I miss that spot?” Chanyeol lamented beside him.

“Is that _Sehun_?”

And indeed it was the junior boy, stepping out of the Audi and practically _prancing_ towards the entrance like he fucking owned the place. Chanyeol, Baekhyun, and Jongdae just stared at him with their jaws on the floor.

“What in the—

But before Baekhyun could finish the sentence, a splash of water came crashing straight into his face.

\--

“I can’t believe you got a water condom to the face.” Chanyeol said, still laughing. Baekhyun could picture him bending over, shaking in laughter at _his_ expense.

“Oh, shut up Chanyeol.” Baekhyun said from the bathroom stall where he was changing his soaked clothes.

When he emerged from it, he walked straight to the mirror above the sink, looking at his reflection. His t-shirt got completely soaked and because he didn’t have practice until Wednesday, he didn’t have his track uniform with him and his only option was an old hoodie that Chanyeol had in the trunk of his car. It was purple and had the words “sexual fantasies” in bright red letters on the front. And it was too big on him, almost reaching his knees.

“I look ridiculous.” he said.

“What are you saying? That’s a trendsetter.” Chanyeol said, trying to suppress his laughter with a fist on his mouth. 

“You’re enjoying this whole thing way too much.” 

“Of course I am.”

He looked at himself in the mirror again. He looked stupid. 

“I can’t believe Sehun got a car before me. _I’m_ graduating this year”

“First of all, Sehun can actually reach the pedal.” Chanyeol said, which earns him a hard smack on the arm. “Ow— okay, okay, sorry.” he rubbed his arm, pouting like a child.“Besides, since we’re all graduating this year, maybe his parents figured out he would no longer have a ride to school. _And_ you hate driving anyway.”

“Maybe I wouldn’t hate it if I had an Audi.”

“Yeah, well. Keep dreaming, man.” he patted him on the shoulder.

He sighed, stepping out of the boys’ restroom and onto the busy hallways with Chanyeol trailing behind. He could see the curious stares of his classmates locked to the front of his hoodie and he could only hope that their English was as bad as Sehun’s.

\--

Baekhyun lets his food tray fall carelessly on the table and slumps his body next to Jongdae. Chanyeol jumps, almost spilling his food on the history homework he forgot to do and was now speeding through at lunchtime. Jongin looks at him with an annoyed expression as some of Baekhyun’s food splashed on his face.

“Baek, I’m gonna smell like kimchi the rest of the day.” he whines.

Baekhyun at least had the decency to say sorry, as he moved his food around with his chopsticks, annoyed. The start of his long-awaited last year of high school just kept going downhill. It began with that water condom incident on the first day, he only shared _one_ class with his friends, he got a pimple the size of an ostrich’s egg right at the tip of his nose—as everyone kindly pointed it out— yesterday and he still hadn’t been able to confess to Yixing even well into their third week of senior year. The only thing he wanted for now was for classes to be over so that he can finally go to his track practice and run his frustration away.

Yixing joins them on the table and sits next to Baekhyun. He is not carrying a lunch tray, but a Carl’s Jr bag, which means he had a free period before lunch. He smiles—one of those sweet Yixing smiles—and Baekhyun beams, his mood lightning up a little bit.

“Why are you so cranky anyway?” Chanyeol asks without looking up from his paper.

“It’s been a tough week,” Baekhyun says.

“It’s Tuesday.”

Baekhyun shoots him a glare.

“Aw, Baek.” Yixing starts. “Is this about the water condom again?” he asks and Jongin laughs at Baekhyun’s look of betrayal.

“We agreed to not bring that up again for the rest of the year” he cries, shoulders slouching.

Yixing smiles again, a little apologetic. “Sorry.” he says and offers Baekhyun some of his fries. 

He blushes and feels a bit embarrassed at how easy it was to forgive him.

Sehun then comes running, uncaring for the few students that stop in their tracks in order to avoiding being run over by him and falls between Jongin and Chanyeol, black beanie slightly askew and an unusual bright smile on his face that can only mean _trouble_. “Gentlemen. I have great news!”

He looked at everyone expectantly for a few seconds and it is _only_ after everyone in the table asked about what he meant that he proceeds. “I just signed up for the student council.”

They stare at him.

“You what?”

“Why?” 

“Because,” he starts “I want to give you all the best senior year experience and that’s not gonna happen if we leave all the school events to Do Kyungsoo and his committee who is too afraid to say no to him.”

Chanyeol and Baekhyun look at each other. Both were also part of the student council as the respective captains of the track and basketball team and no matter how offended, they couldn’t deny the truth. No one would ever dare to contradict Kyungsoo.

“Wait, you can’t be part of the student council if you’re not the captain of a club…” Yixing interjects. Sehun steals a fry from him.

He doesn’t bother to finish chewing before speaking.“That’s when being the leader of the Audiovisual Club for two years comes in handy. I’ve decided to regain my power.” 

“Kyungsoo is going to kill you. This is very important for him”. Jongin says with a very serious face.

“Not to mention that the AV Club only has two members—and Yukhei just joined last week!” Baekhyun adds, mouth stuffed with fries.

Sehun groans, annoyed. This was obviously not the answer he expected from his friends. “I’m not feeling the support I deserve.”

“We support you,” Yixing says , placing a hand on his shoulder. Chanyeol raises an eyebrow at him.

“How are you so sure you’ll be in the committee, anyway? Kyungsoo will probably kick you out after he’s announced as the Student President.”

“That’s where you’re wrong” Sehun smiled, wickedly smug, leaning closer to the table as he informed of his ploy. “Since Junmyeon graduated and Kyungsoo is stepping up from vice president to president, there’s one spot available. The student council needs ten members in the committee, including the president, in order to function accordingly to the school’s rules. And there’s only two clubs left: the AV Club or the Anime Club lead by…”

“Lee Junhui…” Chanyeol says with a shudder.

“Lee Junhui, exactly.” Sehun finished, leaning back into his seat with a satisfied grin. “So it’s either me or the guy who draws hentai fanart of his classmates on the bathroom stalls.”

Baekhyun’s mouth contorted into an uncomfortable grimace, remembering that time he entered the third cubicle in the bathroom of the left-wing and, just as he was zipping down his pants to do his business, he saw the lewd drawing of him in a compromising position and fucking _fox ears and a tail_. Baekhyun refused to enter that bathroom ever again.

“How long have you been plotting this?” Jongdae asks and Sehun thanks him for at least looking impressed.

“All. Summer.”

Baekhyun sighs. It seemed like there was no way to back Sehun from his plan and, even if it pained him to admit it, Sehun might make the committee reunions a little more interesting or at least have some good propositions to add to the table when planning the social activities for this school year.

“Whatever, Kyungsoo is gonna kill you.” Jongin finishes.

“You know what,” he says standing up from his chair and pushing his black beanie down, “You’re all gonna thank me for this later. I’m exiting the chat now.”

All five heads look at him worriedly as he walks way, throwing a peace sign in the air.

\---

On Friday, Kyungsoo is named the Student Body President. He only had a few minutes of enjoying the applause and beaming, when his big smile turned into a murderous glare as the committee members were announced and Sehun fired a party popper when they called his name. 

\--

The first party of the school year promised to be a great hit. It was at Kim Seokjin’s aunt’s house. And if Kim Seokjin was already loaded, his aunt, second spouse of the CFO of the Samsung head office in Japan, was a fucking queen. Therefore, the house aforementioned was a _mansion_ and the perfect place to get started on the school year social shenanigans .

It was modern, luxurious, huge, with a long chandelier that fell like a waterfall in the middle of the living room and an infinite pool that had an _actual_ waterfall. 

It was, Baekhyun thought, the perfect place to finally confess his feelings to the love of his life.

He arrived at the party later than he usually would—normally, he would take a ride with Chanyeol and be there as soon as the party started— but he hated to admit that he delayed his entrance and took his sweet time in to decide on what would be the perfect rom-com outfit to confess to his long-loved crush. So now he skimmed through the sweaty bodies of partying teenagers to find his man, or at least, anyone he actually knew.

He was greeted by Taehyung, who was already pretty buzzed judging by the way he happily danced towards him but before he could ask if he had seen anyone from his group, Taehyung led him to the kitchen and offered him several different drinks, before deciding he was going to prepare him something himself. And, after mixing some bottles and a red juice, he placed a red cup, filled with a dubious liquid, in his hand and walked away.

He took one sip from the cup—it tasted like 80% alcohol, 20% red kool-aid and 100% hungover- and he decided to quietly leave it on the counter. Baekhyun looked around, but still didn’t see any of his friends and he was lowkey afraid of leaving the kitchen and running into Taehyung again, fearing the younger boy will talk him into drinking something else.

“Hey,” he heard a familiar voice “Are you drinking _that_?”

“Oh, thank god you’re here,” he said, settling into the relaxing presence of Chanyeol. “I was getting stressed. And no, I’m not drinking that.” he answered, giving the red cup a foul look.

“Yeah, didn’t think you would.” he laughed, “Why were you la—wait, is that my jacket?”

“Uh, yeah” Baekhyun said, looking down at the big leather jacket and blushing. “You left it at my house a few weeks ago. I figured it looked good with the outfit, sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Chanyeol said with a huge smile. “It does look really good on you, anyway.”

Baekhyun blushed even harder and muttered a small ‘thanks’, before looking around, still searching for the Chinese boy. Yixing was nowhere in sight but he did locate—more like _hear_ — Jongdae outside, riding an _electric rodeo bull_.

“That’s… unexpected.” he said, motioning to the mechanic game.

“Yeah, this house is full of surprises. I think it’s awesome, though. I’ll get on it when the queue shortens down.” Chanyeol said excitedly. 

Baekhyun noticed that he still hadn't looked away from him and even though it was just Chanyeol, the attention made him anxious. More than he already was. “Why were you late then?” 

“I was a bit nervous.”

“Nervous? Why?”

“Today’s the big day, Chanyeol.” he said, excitement growing through him as he held onto the taller’s arm.

“What, you’re losing your virginity?—Ow, _ow_! it was just a joke Baek, settle down.”

“Stop dicking around. And no, today is the day I tell Yixing.”

Chanyeol’s smile faltered for a small second but was quickly replaced with another, much tighter. “Ah,” he took Baekhyun’s rejected cup from the counter and finished it in one gulp “Good luck with that.”

“Thanks,” he said smiling, unaware of the other’s discomfort. “Do you even know where Yixing is?”

“Nope. Haven’t seen him all night.” he answered, as he rummaged through the different bottles on the counter.

“BAEKHYUN!” he heard before he was engulfed in a big hug.

“Minseok hyung! So nice to see you.” Baekhyun said, hugging the older back.

“Baek, you need to be on my beer pong team. The rest of them suck.” he said, before dragging him away. Baekhyun only had a fragment of a second to look at Chanyeol downing another drink, before his field of vision was covered by the sea of people.

  
  
  
  


Three games of beer pong later that he, Minseok and Jongdae, who joined them by the second round obviously won because they were the beer pong masters, —mostly Minseok, if he was honest— and one bull ride later, he still had yet to find the Chinese boy. 

Maybe, _maybe,_ some could say that he was stalling, but he was decided to do it tonight, nevertheless.

As he emerged from the bathroom, he felt like he needed to use the little liquid courage he had in him to his advantage. He was not drunk but he was buzzed enough to feel confident and he was afraid he might not have that later. 

He wandered around the house, looking for Yixing in every teen-filled room until he finally saw him, all across the room that was used as a dance floor and through the fancy sliding glass door, sitting on the edge of the pool with his phone in his hand—not the brightest move, but no matter how in love, Baekhyun couldn’t say that Yixing had the brightest mind. He heard a commotion in the room behind him, probably the crowd crying after the fate of some poor soul being yeeted from the mechanic bull or another loser of a drinking game. Either way, Baekhyun didn’t care. He was decided to do this _tonight_.

He adjusted his (Chanyeol’s) jacket and took a deep breath. Just as he started making his way through the dancing forms, he felt a hand tugging his. It was Kyungsoo.

“Baekhyun, help!” 

“What? _Now?_ What’s happening?” he asked, frustrated.

“It’s Chanyeol. He’s been on a rampage all night and now he’s on Seokjin’s aunt’s table attempting to breakdance.”

“What?!” he asked confused, then looked back at Yixing. Some girl had walked up to him and they were chatting now. “Do you really need me? Can’t you just ask Sehun or Jongin to manhandle him off the table?”

“We’ve tried. I’m desperate here.”

Then they heard a loud banging noise, a gasp from the crowd, and a hard _thump_. People kept murmuring things but sounded more genuinely concerned than before. Baekhyun’s stomach dropped. He hurried past Kyungsoo through the crowd to find Chanyeol passed out on the floor, Sehun and Jongin trying to hold him up.

“What the hell happened?!” he asked once he reached the boys.

“Dumbass hit his head on the chandelier and passed out.”

“What?! Wake him up! He might have a concussion.”

Sehun slapped him not so lightly a couple of times and Jongin nudged him on the shoulder. Baekhyun looked around and snatched a cup from one of the bystanders, ignoring his dirty look and threw the liquid on Chanyeol’s face.

Startled, the taller boy blinked himself awake. 

“ _What the fuck_?”

“Yeah, Chanyeol, what the fuck were you thinking?” he chided.

He took Chanyeol by the hand, dragging him up forcefully to one of the sofas close by, the other three boys trailing behind him. He sat beside Chanyeol and then turned to Kyungsoo.

“Bring some water please and something to eat. Preferably something spicy.” he asked and the other one nodded and left, Jongin going after him. He turned to Chanyeol, who was dozing off again before Baekhyun shook him forcefully. “Don’t fall asleep, idiot! I don’t know how hard you hit yourself and I don’t want you choking on your own vomit.”

“Everything… head...spins.”

“Yeah, very eloquent” Baekhyun huffed. “What the hell were you thinking?! You could've died!”

The other didn’t say much, only groaned something about being too loud and Baekhyun rolled his eyes, annoyed. He’ll scold him when he gets more sober.

About half an hour later, after Baekhyun forced him to drink three glasses of water and to eat a packet of salty crackers - the only thing Kyungsoo could find in the pantry that had already been raided by party-crazed teeangers, Chanyeol was looking a bit more awake, not really sober, but at least not dangerously drunk, resting his head on Baekhyun’s shoulder and watching the TV. At some point, someone had turned on the device and a marathon of We Bear Bears seemed to be the perfect treatment to calm down drunk teenagers. Baekhyun, at one point, heard Seokjin’s characteristic windshield laugh in the back after one particularly funny scene. Even Jongdae had finally joined them and was sitting on the floor, head drawn back on the sofa behind him as he slept.

“Is he drunk too?” Baekhyun asked.

“Nah,” Minseok answered. “I think this is the result of riding the mechanic bull eight times in a row. He must be exhausted.”

Baekhyun nodded. Chanyeol seemed to notice the movement and lifted his head from his shoulder, turning to look at him.

“Baek. What did he say?”

“What? Who?”

“Yixing. What did he say?”

Baekhyun groaned, pushing Chanyeol’s head back on his shoulder with more strength than necessary. “I couldn’t speak to him. I got a bit preoccupied with _something else._ ” he gave him a pointed look that the other felt, more than saw.

“I’m sorry.” he murmured.

“Whatever. I guess it was not meant to be today.” he said. 

If he was honest, he hadn’t thought of Yixing this past hour, as he was worried that Chanyeol was going to die of alcohol poisoning. The idea of confessing his love for someone just seemed too far-fetched for the moment. It was probably better to do it when they were all sober, including himself.

About five We Bear Bears episodes later, he dozed off too.

Next morning, he woke up on the sofa next to Chanyeol, using his shoulder as a pillow, while Sehun was at their feet, using his legs as a pillow for himself. He looked around as much as he could without really moving, to see Kyungsoo, Jongin and Jimin on the other couch. Jongdae and a couple more bodies under a blanket—or more like a tablecloth— were on the floor. 

He didn’t want to imagine the state of the rest of the house, much less of its inhabitants, so he just rested his head back on his friend’s shoulder and went back to sleep again, enjoying the warmth and commodity, deciding to deal with life later.

\---

Every two to three weeks, they were supposed to attend student committee meetings. Back when Junmyeon hyung was the vice president, most of the meetings were him monotonically reading the school rules guide and going onto the same calendar over and over, maybe discussing some events or scheduling areas for club reunions. And sometimes all they did was sit in awkward silence while Junmyeon cracked a cringey dad-joke that they all pretended to laugh at. It wasn't that Junmyeon was a _bad_ president. He wasn’t at all. It’s just that he was so methodic and so enthusiastic about following the school protocol that the fun was quickly swept away from any plan. Baekhyun couldn’t blame him. His hyung depended on a perfect record to get him to where he was now.

But the first committee meeting with Kyungsoo as a president was…. interesting. They started reading the damn school manual, as always, but at least this time Kyungsoo only gave everyone a copy and waited fifteen seconds for everyone to read it—which of course, didn’t happen.

He should’ve guessed—more like, expected, for the dynamic of the committee to change with the new, rather random addition of Sehun to the group. 

On the round table of the teacher’s room, all the leaders and captains of the differents clubs were seated. Baekhyun represented his track team and to his right were junior student Lee Taeyong, captain of the swimming team and Lee Mark, the newest addition along with Sehun, an an-over enthusiastic freshman who was president of the chess club. A little further were Choi Soo Bin, a sophomore president of the Art Club— he wasn’t exactly sure what the Art Club did on their periods, as all Baekhyun has ever seen from its leader these past two years has been him dozing off on every meeting and _eating_ on the ones he was actually awake on— and Sehun representing his two-man AV club. Standing right across Baekhyun was Park Jiyeon, leader of the glee club, who hated him with all her tiny heart for his constant rejection of joining the her club, no matter how she asked him _every single semester._ It’s not that he didn’t have confidence in his singing skills, it’s actually _them_ who lacked any talent save for Jiyeon and another male member he didn’t know the name of. Jiyeon blamed Baekhyun’s dismissal for her club’s lack of success, but there was no way in hell he’d ever join. 

And then to his left were Kim Jisoo, Kyungsoo’s vice president, Mr. Study Body president himself, Kang Seulgi, captain of the cheerleading team, popping her gum while carelessly looking through the manual, as if she hadn't been reading those same words for three years straight, and then finally Chanyeol, with whom Baekhyun was having an intense battle of silly faces to see who would break first and earn a chastisement from Kyungsoo.

Baekhyun chuckled behind his fist when Kyungsoo finally shot Chanyeol a glare for interrupting the comfortable silence with one of his loud laughs after Baekhyun pulled a particularly funny cross-eyed-hissing-teeth face that he knew the taller wouldn’t be able to resist.

“I’ll take it as if everyone already read the manual we were given.” Kyungsoo started.

“Like every year.”

“Alright then, let’s start the planning of this school year calendar. Does anyone have a suggestion or any appointed date we need to overview?” he asked pushing his glasses up.

“The Cheerleading team needs to reserve the school’s gym for the annual Bake-Off.” the cheerleader captain intercepted.

“Seulgi, the Bake-Off is not until January.” Baekhyun retorted, rolling his eyes.

“I need to have the date well secured and all of you and your teams prepared to assist,” she said as she eyed every single person there with a pointed look. “Last year was a flop because of your lack of solidarity with the team. We barely raised enough money to pay for the buses to the competition.”

Baekhyun wanted to object that the reason the Bake-Off was a flop was not the lack of assistants but rather the lack of cooking skills from the cheerleaders. Baekhyun very clearly remembers assisting with the track team and watching how poor Jungkook bought at least half a dozen of cupcakes for him and his friends, only to throw them in the trash with a disgusted scowl after just one bite.

“Yes, Byun,” Jiyeon snarls, her evil gaze never leaving Baekhyun, “you don’t have to bring everybody down with your negativity.”

“Yes, Seulgi. We’ll all be there.” Kyungsoo said before Baekhyun could even speak to defend himself. “But what’s a priority here is discussing the events for at least the upcoming couple of months. I’m open to take any sugge—”

Sehun slammed in the middle of the table what seemed to be a poorly organized scrapbook. It had different color pages peeking out from all sides and even some glitter that came out in a huff after being slammed.

“I have everything planned.” Sehun announced proudly, standing up from his chair.

Baekhyun saw Kyungsoo's jaw tighten and Jisoo take the notebook and flip through the pages—staining her small hands with glitter glue in the process.

“Sehun, the planning of the calendar is done by the whole committee after discussing it and agreeing together.” the president states, trying very hard to keep his posture as Sehun rolls his eyes.

“Then discuss it and approve of it. It’s great. I’ve been planning it carefully.”

“We could all just agree on it and save us all the trouble.” Seulgi said, popping a bubble with her gumm.

“You don’t even know what you are agreeing to,” Kyungsoo voiced. He sighed and then turned to Jisoo. “Just pass it around, let’s see what we can salvage from it.”

Sehun sat back on his chair, pleased.

“Is there any other important upcoming event we need to discuss?”

“The famous Senior Prank.” Chanyeol announced excitedly.

Baekhyun felt Taeyong go stiff behind him and all he could do was place some comforting pats on his shoulder. The boy had the horrible misfortune to be one of the victims of the Senior Prank when he was only a freshman. The school’s pool had been filled with invisible ink and he and the rest of his team ended up sporting a blue tinge on their bodies and hair for the next two days, as the ink was stronger than the perpetrator of the prank had anticipated. Baekhyun had the feeling that the shy junior had left with some kind of PTSD after that.

“We do not support nor encourage any kind of pranks, Chanyeol. It’s against the manual.”

“It’s an iconic tradition, Kyungsoo. You may not support it, but we need to be prepared.”

The meeting was not uneventful after that but at least there wasn’t any awkward quarrels. Some of the events from Sehun’s plan were considered viable while other were totally dismissed—no matter how much the younger cried that a Bring-Your-Pets-To-School was necessary, Kyungsoo did not budge. The president dismissed them all shortly after Soobin started snoring on the table. 

  
  


\--

Baekhyun was finishing his sixth and last lap of the day and his legs felt a little bit wobbly. The coach stopped the timer as he messily crossed the finishing line, stumbling and almost falling on his face. His legs hurt so he let himself collapse on the ground with an exhausted groan, a few meters away from the end. When he turned to look at the coach, he didn’t look pleased but he didn’t ask him for another lap, which meant that _at least_ he wasn’t behind on time. 

“Go take a shower and come to my office. There’s something I’d like to discuss with you.” coach Kim said.

Baekhyun just nods, throwing an arm over his eyes and let himself fall back into the pad of the track, panting exhaustedly.

  
  


Half an hour later, there he was, much fresher in a clean, sweat-less hoodie and wet hair sticking to his forehead. Coach Kim sat in front of him, busy rummaging for something in the drawers of his desk. He let out an excited _“Ah”_ when he finally found a neatly folded piece of paper.

“Baekhyun,” he started, “have you decided on a university yet?”

He shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “No.” he admitted and honestly, he was really trying to postpone thinking about it. His mother kept pestering him all summer to research the universities around town and find something _cheap_ and _close_ that he might like. But the mere idea of going to a school with those two words as its first description swept away the tiny drop of excitement that college inspired him.

Despite Baekhyun’s lack of enthusiasm, Coach Kim smiled brightly, sliding the folded paper in front of him. It was a pamphlet. 

“Seoul National University?” Baekhyun looked at him, unbelieving. “Coach, I’m sorry, but even if I could afford it, which I don’t, I hardly believe I’d be accepted.”

“One of the coaches from their track team contacted me. They’re looking for someone to write a recommendation letter. They've been following you closely…”

Baekhyun sat there speechless. _Could it be possible?_

“You went to the Nationals on your freshman year.”

“But we didn’t win. Last year we couldn’t even make it past the regionals.” he argued.

“But that’s still a great notch on your belt, Baekhyun,” he says, clearly more excited than the student. “And this year, we might make it.”

Baekhyun looked at the pamphlet in his hands. 

SNU was a great school. One of the best. But also one of the most expensive schools. And on top of that, it had the highest demands in applications. The idea of joining it seemed too good to be true. 

He looked at his Coach again, who still had excitement all over his face. It gave him a little bit of hope that at least someone here believed there was a chance for him.

“Your grades are okay, but they’re not great. I understand that you’re good at Biology, right?” the student nodded. “That’s also a plus. But you need to work on math, maybe get a tutor and start studying English. As far as track goes, you’re still the fastest in the team. This coach said that he was really interested in you and another guy from another school, Park Jinyoung, you know him, right?”

“He’s the one who beat me at the Regionals.” Baekhyun said bitterly, as if trying to make a point.

“You could still win. If you go reach Nationals this year, it’s almost guaranteed.”

He looked at his Coach, pensive. This was a lot of information to take on and Baekhyun didn’t want to let the excitement, the hope, to skyrocket to the sky only to drop him free fall on his ass and crash onto reality. 

“Is this even a possibility?” he finally asked.

Coach Kim beamed.

“It is, Baekhyun. But it doesn’t mean it’s going to be easy. Discipline is the key factor. It means training at least three times a week, running every day, saying goodbye to milkshakes and rice-cakes and carbs.”

Baekhyun already hated the idea.

“And then?”

“Then you have to apply for the school and pass the exam and the interview. But with the win in your pockets and most importantly, the recommendation letter, it’s almost certain that you’ll get it.”

He still didn’t know what to say., He felt overwhelmed. 

“But I believe you can do it. You have potential. And this is a great opportunity for you to get into one of Korea's best schools. I’m happy to guide you through it but I need to know that you’re willing to do your part too.”

Baekhyun wanted to cry. He felt nervous, angry, excited and... stupid. 

He knew this was something amazing, a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, but he also knew that he was just an average student in a small town who was just a bit faster at running than average. Just an average student often indulging in leisure to avoid having to dealing with reality.

He wanted to say no. That there was no use. It wasn’t going to happen…

But instead, he nodded his head, agreeing. Coach Kim cheered.

  
  
  


Not much later, he was exiting the school, bag on his shoulder, head full of contradictory thoughts and chest fluttering with weird, unknown and scary feelings. He debated whether he should tell his mom or not. He didn’t even know if she’d like the idea. Sure it was a great school, but it was expensive, even with a scholarship. And it definitely wasn’t close to home…

Baekhyun was so lost in his thoughts that he almost missed the figure standing next to the school gates. 

“Hey!”

It was Chanyeol.

“Hey… why are you still here?”

“Had a late practice. Saw you coming out of the showers when I was finishing, so I figured you could use a ride?”

“Yeah, thanks.” he answered. 

His original plan was to take the bus home, which was usually not a problem, but he appreciated the commodity of a car, a friend and not having to be in a bus full of people when he already felt anxious enough already.

  
  


The car ride home was mostly silent. Chanyeol turned on the radio and hummed to whatever song was playing but Baekhyun didn’t feel the energy to do even that. He usually would be singing along to almost every song but he was tired and moody and stressed today, and honestly, he just wanted to get home and fall face first onto his bed. 

“You look constipated,” Chanyeol said when they were nearing his house.

“Huh?”

“You look constipated. What’s wrong?’”

Baekhyun huffed. He didn’t want to talk about it but on the other hand, he also didn’t want to keep it a secret. He felt like he needed to tell at least one person and get another involve someone else in the situation. Definitely not someone in the track team because it would be awful to rub something like that in their faces. Not his mom, or, at least, not yet. And not any of his friends because what if he failed? Everyone would know and that just would make everything worse. 

He supposed there was no harm in telling Chanyeol. 

“I might have been offered a scholarship for SNU.”

“ _What?”_ Chanyeol asked. The car halted dangerously and Baekhyun looked at him, scared.

“Chanyeol, what the fuck!”

But the taller didn’t listen, and quickly pulled aside instead, parking on the side of the road. Baekhyun didn’t understand why, they were just a few blocks from his house.

“Seoul’s National University?”

“Yeah.”

“I can’t believe it.”

“Yeah, thanks.” Baekhyun said with a grimace.

“No, no, Baekhyun. That’s great!” Chanyeol said delightedly. “I’m going there too.”

“What?”

“I got an early-acceptance. I had recommendation letters from my piano and percussion teacher. I have an excellent GPA and being the captain of the basketball team helped too.”

“Why didn’t you say anything?” he asked, almost offended.

“I didn’t want to feel like I was bragging. Besides, it might spoil it. But you’re going there too! That’s awesome! We’ll be together!” 

The poor boy was almost jumping from his seat but Baekhyun sunk further into his.

“I don’t think so. I have to win the regionals and increase my GPA. I really doubt that I’ll get the school—auch! What the hell!”

“What are you saying?! You’re the fastest in the whole school, probably the whole district. You’re pretty smart. You and Kyungsoo won the science fair last year!”

“It was just a school fair, Chanyeol. It wasn’t much competition. Nearly everyone did the volcano thing with the vinegar and baking sod—

Chanyeol smacked him again.

“Yah! Stop it!”

“Why are you being so negative about it? You know you’re great, Baekhyun!”

“My GPA is not as good as yours or Kyungsoo’s! And the other kid I’m competing against, Jinyoung, is pretty fast too. I—I…” he saw Chanyeol ready to smack him again. He exhaled, defeated. “I just don’t wanna get my hopes up.”

Baekhyun saw Chanyeol’s hand moving towards him, flinching when he thought he was getting smacked once more but instead, he felt a comforting grip on his forearm. Chanyeol ran a hand through his hair, messing it the process and then looked at him straight in the eye.

“You _are_ great, Baekhyun. You really are. I get that you’re scared, but I truly believe that you can get it.” his thumb caressed him slightly, still gripping his arm. “You just need to believe it too.”

He felt uneasy. It was the second time that day that someone told him that they believed in him but something still stirred unsurely in Baekhyun’s stomach. He really wanted this. He did. But the thought of getting excited about it and then having his heart broken... They said that _if you never try, you’ll never know._ Except Baekhyun _didn’t want to know._ He thought he’d have a little more time before he had to worry about college. Yes, he was a senior but he thought he could procrastinate his feelings until the next semester and dedicate this one to just enjoying himself. But if someone believed in him it must mean something, right? And not just someone. His coach, who has been training him for almost two years and his _best friend._ If there was anyone who knew Baekhyun better than himself, it was Chanyeol. And Chanyeol never lied to him. That must mean something, right?

“I have to get a math tutor and cut down on carbs.” he finally said.

“I’ll do it. I’ll tutor you.”

“You’re too busy, Chanyeol…”

“We can turn Game Night into Study Night.” he offered.

“... No.”

“Baek!” he hit him again. “This is more important.”

Baekhyun pouted. Ever since he and Chanyeol became friends and discovered their shared love for video games, they turned every Thursday night into Game Night. It was precious for Baekhyun. He had just bought the last Death Stranding the week before and he was waiting to play it for the first time this week with Chanyeol. 

They couldn’t. He couldn’t.

 _Discipline._ Coach Kim had said. _Discipline is the key factor._

He kicked his feet like a child, throwing a little tantrum before saying “Okay, Study Nights every Thursday.”

\--

Thursday came and, sure enough, they were in Baekhyun’s bedroom, going over algebra problems while Baekhyun threw longing glances to the blue package of his game, cellophane still intact.

\--

It was oddly rainy that day. Not strong enough to soak you through but enough to wet your face uncomfortably. No one was on the benches on the front patio so that meant the school cafeteria was packed. The line for lunch was even longer than normal because if many students usually decided to buy food from outside on their free period, rainy days had all these starving teenagers look like they were suddenly crazy about the lunch ladies’ warm tofu soup.

Sehun watched the scene in front of him with a scowl of disgust; Chanyeol was picking cucumbers from Baekhyun’s plate and placing them on his own. In exchange, he gave the shortest boy a couple of his fish cakes which the other dug in happily. 

“Can’t you two get more married already?”

Chanyeol looked up, ignoring his comment and focusing instead on the electronic device right next to Sehun. “What’s up with that?”

Sehun smiled as if he had been waiting for someone to ask him precisely that. “This, my dear hyung, is my new best friend.”

Jongin made a muffled sound, offended, mouth still around his chopsticks as he looked over to Sehun. The younger waved a hand dismissively, picked up the video camera and pointed it right at his friend's face. 

“I’m filming a documentary.” 

“The fuck?” Jongdae asked as Sehun closed up on his face, frame only capturing his full cheek, his left eye, and his brow furrowed in annoyance. 

“Kyungsoo said that the AV club needed to present a final project at the end of the school year, so I came up with the great idea of capturing the wonderful and amazing last year of high school as lived by my six best friends. Your last remaining days of joy before being pushed into adulthood” he explained, camera jumping from one friend to another.

“You sound like Baekhyun before he got a condom to the face,” Chanyeol said.

 _“You sound like Baekhyun before he got a condom to the face.”_ Baekhyun repeated, using his best bum-like voice and wiggling his face funnily, which always managed to get on his friends’ nerves. Chanyeol retorted by smacking him on the head with his chopsticks and it was all it took for the two of them to start a battle of tiny smacks and little punches that looked more comical than hectoring.

“What are you even filming anyway?” Jongin asked, once satisfied and done with his food.

“This.” Sehun motioned to his fighting friends—who were now tumbling onto the floor, still trying to smack each other wherever they could—as if it was an obvious answer. “You’re all basically a living sitcom.”

“What’s happening here?”

Sehun turned the camera to Kyungsoo, just in time as the older rolled his eyes, set his tray on the table and walked over to his friends on the ground. With a precision remarkably similar to that of a tired mother scolding her frantic children, he reached down between the two and in one swift movement, managed to get a hold of their ears followed by two screeches of pain. He lifted them up by their ears, ignoring their cries.

“Stop. Embarrassing. Me.”

Kyungsoo only let go of their ears once they were seated back on the bench, both boys rubbing their abused cartilages.

Sehun turned to Jongin, the camera never leaving the two boys before him. “What did I say?”

Jongdae laughs through a mouthful of rice as Kyungsoo sat beside him and pushed Sehun’s camera out of his face.

“Where’s Yixing?” he asked.

“In the library, said he had something to do.” Baekhyun answered, still rubbing his ear with the palm of his hand.

“More like someone to do,” Jongdae grinned wickedly.

“What do you mean?” Baekhyun’s gaze turned to him with pointed curiosity.

“I’ve seen him with this new girl from our year. He’s clearly onto something.”

Before Baekhyun could ask _who_ and _where_ and _why,_ Kyungsoo was already speaking again.

“Whatever. Do you all have your Halloween costumes ready?”

Everyone looked at him as if he had suddenly grown a second head but Kyungsoo simply started digging into his food, clearly unbothered by their confused stares.

“Since when do _you_ care about Halloween?” Chanyeol asked, voicing everyone’s thoughts.

“Yeah, the most elaborate costume I’ve seen you put on is an alien mask from the convenience store.”

“I’m planning a contest for the school on Halloween. Everyone will come in a costume.” he explained, still not sounding very excited. “It was Sehun’s idea but I think it’s good. However, I need you to confirm your costumes, in case no one else comes disguised. I don’t want to look dumb.”

“So you’re bringing us down with you?”

Kyungsoo shrugged.

“What are you going to be, Mr. Student Body President?” Jongdae asked him, crossing his arms.

He shrugged again. “Whatever they have in the convenience store that day.”

“You’re the School’s President. _Mr. Hot Stuff._ Our great leader. Aren’t you supposed to have something amazing that leaves everyone gaping in shame?” Sehun asked him, zooming on his face to emphasize every title. Kyungsoo pushed it down again.

“Yeah, hyung. You can’t just have a lame costume!” Jongin agreed.

“Well, what do you suggest I be?”

Baekhyun and Chanyeol spoke in unison. “ _Satan_ soo.”

They didn’t get a chance to laugh before Kyungsoo tried to rip off their ears again, Sehun filmed everything excitedly. 

\---

Study nights with Chanyeol weren’t exactly boring—he could never be bored with the giant by his side— but they sure as hell were not what Baekhyun would prefer to be doing on a tuesday night after school.

They’d been going over the same problems for hours and Baekhyun still couldn’t get it. He was getting frustrated and he could tell that Chanyeol was too, distraught evident in his voice as he suddenly got up from his seat next to Baekhyun and announced that he needed a shower. Baekhyun was almost sure that the other had taken a shower at school after his basketball practice, because his hair was still wet when he picked him up , but he did not stop him as he made his way to his en-suite bathroom. 

Taking advantage of Chanyeol’s absence, Baekhyun decided to take a break from those awfully hard equations and helped himself to Chanyeol’s laptop, hoping to liberate a little bit of his own frustration with a round of Overwatch.

He knew that he probably should have still been working on the problem but _honestly,_ if he couldn’t grasp it in the last hours with the help of math-genius Chanyeol, he sure as hell wouldn’t get it on his own in the next twenty minutes. So he might as well play and try not to think about his impending failure in the future. 

“What are you doing?!” Chanyeol said when he came out of the bathroom, steam seething through the door behind him and caught Baekhyun red handed on the pc.

But Baekhyun couldn’t answer, staring dumbfounded at his best friend in front of him. 

Chanyeol was standing across him, droplets of water still sliding down his shirtless torso, wearing only a pair of gray sweatpants. His chest grew red at Baekhyun’s shameless staring.

“When did you get _abs_?” he asked, sounded rather offended.

Chanyeol flicked the towel at him. 

“Over the summer. When I accompanied Minseok hyung to the gym while you stayed inside playing Sims 4 all day.”

Baekhyun frowned. “Yah! Does the jock attitude come in pair with the jock body?”

“Shut up.” Chanyeol said, sliding a hoodie on. “S-stop staring at me like that!”

“I’m completely flabbergasted by the revelation that my best friend suddenly got so… _hot_ . I can’t help it.” Baekhyun said, ignoring the way Chanyeol’s eyes widened at the compliment. “Where does that leave _me_?”

“Maybe if you came to the gym with us you could get ripped too.” the other shrugged.

Baekhyun looked down at himself. He lifted his sweatshirt to look at his own torso. “I do have abs.”

“Those are skinny-abs. They don’t count.” Chanyeol dismissed him. The other just _blinked_ at him, making him the realize how _harsh_ he actually sounded. “I-l’m sorry! I-I didn’t want to be mean. I—

Baekhyun hit him in the face with a pillow before he could even finish his apology.

“Don’t”— _hit_ — “be”— _hit_ — “fucking”— _hit_ —“rude.”

Before he could lose his last brain cell to Baekhyun’s violence, Chanyeol managed to snatch the other pillow from his bed and attack his friend back.

“This is fucking war!” the smaller yelped, and before any other other word was said, they started furiously attacking each other to death with the fluffy war pillows.

When Chanyeol’s mother entered the room five minutes later, carrying the fruit bowls she had prepared for them, she did not even bat an eye at the way Baekhyun was on the ground, straddling her son, trying to suffocate him with a pillow,while the other kept wacking the smaller one the side of his head. 

She simply cleared her throat.

Both boys froze, looking at her from their positions on the ground.

“ _Boys,_ ” she started. “If I see one single white feather floating around, _you’re both grounded.”_

“But Baekhyun’s not your—”

“You’re _both_ grounded.” she said, concluding the exchange.

She set the fruit bowls on Chanyeol’s desk and exited the room but not before throwing one last menacing glare at the pair.

Baekhyun shifted so Chanyeol could get from under him, moving so they were both in a cross-sitting position across each other. Chanyeol rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly.

“I’m sorry if I was mean,” he offered, his eyes reflecting his truth/honesty. “I didn’t meant to offend you. You were making me nervous.”

Baekhyun arched an eyebrow at him. “ _I_ was making you nervous?”

“You always make me nervous.” Chanyeol said under his breath but the other caught it nonetheless.

He was taken aback for a second. “I don’t! Why would I make you nervous?” he argues.

Chanyeol blushed bright red, taking _just a second_ too long before answering. “B-because of your stupid face!”

He was hit in the face with a pillow again.

  
  


It took him more time to realize the change in his best friend’s physique than to notice the _change_ in the people around them. Around Chanyeol, to be exact.

It started one day when Baekhyun went to visit Chanyeol during basketball practice. He didn't have a practice session of his own but they were supposed to study afterwards so he thought of using that free slot of time watching game reviews on his phone while he waited for the taller on the bleachers. Even through his earphones, he could hear the constant chattering of the group of girls sitting a couple feet away from him, watching the basketball team players. It was nothing new for the team members to have fans. Not as many as the football team but definitely enough to satisfy their constantly growing egos. Baekhyun never paid them much attention whenever he came to watch Chanyeol but this time, he heard something that caught his attention.

“Oh my God, look at Chanyeol. He got so _hot_ over the summer, I could jump him.” one of the girls had said.

“I’ve never noticed him before, but he is so tall, I bet he has a big dick too.”

Baekhyun blinked a couple of times, half distraught at hearing someone talk so _hungrily_ and shamelessly about his friend and offended by how looked at his best friend like he was just a piece of meat to be ‘jumped at’ as they clearly put it.

He cleared his throat loudly and shot them a reprimanding look which had them scattering away, red faced and embarrassed at being heard. Baekhyun smiled proudly to himself before returning to his video.

However, there still were longing stares following Chanyeol while the girls walked the hallways. Although he never paid attention to them, Baekhyun certainly did this time. Maybe he was jealous of his friend suddenly getting all the attention, but there was also a sudden urge of protection over Chanyeol that filled him. 

Especially after one specific Committee meeting. 

It had been a particularly hot day. Like the end of the summer just wanted to squeeze out one last bothersome wave of heat just to annoy them. The AC in the teacher’s hall had always been kinda shitty, (Baekhyun almost felt bad for them, having to spend more time in there than them… but they also had their own refrigerator _and_ an espresso machine, so maybe it was just a balance of good for them,) and it left the council members waving tired hands at themselves in a meek attempt to find some relief from the stuffiness of them room. Chanyeol had been wearing the usual basketball team sports jacket but decided to take it off—he knew the taller has zero tolerance of for the hot weather so it was not surprise for him to see him shirtless or in the sleeveless tank tops like the one he was wearing then, but for others, like Seulgi—or even Jiyeon and her snake-like eyes— it was clearly a sight that caught their attention.

“Woah, Park. When did you get this guns?” she said, reaching a hand to press on Chanyeol’s biceps. The other just laughed, flexing his arm a little bit for her amusement. 

Baekhyun had frowned, displeased,feeling the need to put a ‘NO TOUCHING’ sign like a collar around his best friend’s neck because….. that’s just fucking rude, right? No matter how attractive his body looks, it didn’t give people the right to just pounce on him and fondle with his arms and _abs_ just because of the new tonified muscle. Besides, Chanyeol had _always_ been attractive. He was very tall—perfect height for hugging and putting your head underneath his chin. He had a hot, deep, chocolate-y voice that many teenage boys would _kill_ to have.He had beautiful and expressive round eyes, a sleek nose, a strong jaw and plump lips that always looked the _tiniest_ bit pouty and kissable. Sure he had abnormally big ears that stuck out like the ones of a small, green jedi master but Baekhyun thought they were _adorable._ Not to mention they were compensated by a killer smile that was always on his best friends face, anyway. 

If all these people couldn’t appreciate Chanyeol _before_ the muscles, well, then they certainly didn’t deserve to now.

\--

Baekhyun was beyond excited. He was ablaze the only way he could get with his favorite time of the year, Halloween. 

Once he walked through the school,—his mom had driven him after Chanyeol called to inform he had trouble with his costume and was going to be late— he was perplexed to see how many people had dressed up to school. He had to give it to Kyungsoo— _and_ Sehun. It was not an easy task to convince the teenagers students to do something, _anything._ So when almost three quarters of the student population had turned up to school with elaborate Halloween costumes, Baekhyun was beyond impressed. He had a simple costume for himself that morning but he was saving his best for tonight’s party at Minseok’s place.

He was even more astonished when he found the President himself on the corridors of the school, pale makeup all over his skin, dark eyeliner and black attire,his thick rimmed glasses replaced by contact lenses that he only wore for really special occasions. Kyungsoo’s baby face features helped to look even closer to the kid from The Grudge. It sure wasn’t the most complicated disguise but considering how this was probably the second time in his life that he actually prepared for Halloween, Baekhyun was excited for his friend.

“You’re scary!” he said once he reached his friend. “Awesome.”

“Here,” Kyungsoo ignored his compliment and shoved a stack of paper in his hands instead, “Help me hand this.”

He obliged, handing the passing students the paper saying that the winner of the Halloween Costume Contest would be announced at 12 pm during lunch. The winner would win a couple of coupons for a night in Kyunchon Fried Chicken Restaurant and a box of homemade brownies.

“So many people came in costumes, Kyungsoo. I can’t believe you were even worried.”

“I can’t believe all it took it was a promise of fried chicken. I’m really thankful that Jongin’s uncle agreed to give us the coupons.”

Speaking of their friend, there he came dressed as a vampire, pale makeup against his tanned skin and twin lines of blood on either sides of his mouth. Jongdae was next to him, dressed as Georgie from the movie IT. Both of their eyes widened as theys saw Kyungsoo.

“Woah, dude! You actually did it! You look great, very scary.” Jongin said grinning widely at the President.

Baekhyun could almost swear that he saw the man blush under all that white paint. Jongdae, with a cunning look, took some of the papers from Baekhyun’s hands and started handing them too.

  
  
  


Despite the excitement clouding his mind, Baekhyun noticed that neither Chanyeol nor Yixing seemed to be at school,which was extremely strange for both of them. After his fourth period, Baekhyun went to his locker to put away the pillow and blanket he had been carrying. It was part of his costume, but he was getting annoyed at having to carry the artifacts around… Then he saw him. He couldn’t see him, per se, since he had a mask on,but Baekhyun could recognize the tall and lanky—or not that lanky anymore— figure of his best friend.

His jaw dropped.

“Chanyeollie that is AMAZING!”

Chanyeol was wearing a very realistic detailed Deadpool costume. It fit him _greatly_ and Baekhyun felt a little bit guilty at noticing how Chanyeol’s new muscular body seemed to pair perfectly with the anti-hero costume. Ever since that day at Chanyeol’s house, Baekhyun couldn’t help his thoughts from drifting to the image of his best friend’s naked torso. Six-pack abs and toned arms that got along perfectly with the taller’s already very handsome face. Baekhyun felt a nerve cracking every time he caught himself thinking of his best friend like that.

It pained him to admit it but he looked _kinda hot._

“Where did you even get it?” he said, examining the fabric of the costume, unknowingly touching Chanyeol’s hard bicep under it. He felt a blush forming on his neck so he retracted his hand quickly.

“I had it custom made,” Baekhyun could hear the happiness under the mask. Chanyeol loved compliments. “I tutored middle schoolers for months to pay for it. What are you supposed to be?”

He held up his tiny pillow and pointed to the eye-mask perched on his forehead. “Sleepy bunny.”

Chanyeol’s masked head tilted to the right, making him chuckle at the sight of being judged by Deadpool himself. He leaned closer to him, whispering in his ear.

“This isn’t the final costume. I’m saving the grand reveal for Minseok’s party.”

“Oh,” he exclaimed. “So you’re not after those coupons and Kyungsoo’s homemade brownies?”

Baekhyun scoffed. “I could pester Kyungsoo enough to have him make another batch just for me. Besides, I didn’t want to rush in the morning and risk spoiling it. Why were you late anyway?—wait, were you with Yixing?”

“Yixing? No. Why?”

Baekhyun shrugged. “I haven’t seen him all day.”

“Oh,” Chanyeol said, an unknown feeling tinting his voice. “I don’t know about Yixing.”

The bell rang, announcing the start of lunchbreak. Dozens of students started oozing from the classrooms and heading towards the cafeteria. Baekhyun noted proudly how many of them stared—even cheered—at Chanyeol’s costume. He knew his friend would be rejoicing in pride under thar tinted mask. He loved the attention and Baekhyun thought it was well-deserved. He worked really hard for the costume and if there was one person that loved Halloween as much as Baekhyun did, it was the tall giant next to him.

He almost missed Jongdae running towards them, hiding behind Chanyeol.

“Guys, what the fuck, what the _fuck_ I— woah, Chanyeol, great costume,” he eyed the boy up and down and got a thumbs up as a _thank you_ in exchange before regaining the scared look on his face. “ _What the fuuuuuck._ ”

“What’s up with you?”

“There’s some psycho dude dressed as Pennywise that has been following me around all day. He was even outside the bathroom stall when I went take a leak this morning. He scared the crap out of me! I don’t even know who it is and I’m fearing for my life.”

“What?” Baekhyun said laughing but then he noticed the _genuine_ concern on the other’s face. Jongdae didn’t laugh. Instead, he just looked around the corridor and his face suddenly paled when he spotted the mysterious teen dressed as the scary clown.

“Please tell me that you see him too and that I’m not hallucinating.”

Baekhyun scanned the place; people were still coming from different directions for their lunch break and he was about to say he _was_ hallucinating when his gaze stopped on the crawny clown at the end of the hallway.

“Oh, that’s Chenle,” Baekhyun said. “He’s on Taeyong’s swimming team. He’s a freshman, he’s harmless...”

Chenle’s Pennywise disguised figure still stood at the end of the hallway. Even when people moved around him, he was as firm as a statue, staring firmly at Jongdae with a wicked grin. Baekhyun knew the kid and could tell that he was as soft as cotton and a bit of a brat from the few meetings he’s had with him. Still, he could admit that the freshman was taking his role very seriously and his creepy stare sent shivers through him. 

“.... I think.”

The winner of the costume contest was announced around halfway through lunch. Everyone cheered happily. In the end of the day, neither Chanyeol’s realistic deadpool costume nor Chenle’s creepy interpretation of Pennywise won it, but rather a sophomore girl who was dressed in a very comical rendition of Aladdin’s Genie. Her face was painted a smurf blue and she had a thick body suit on that resembled the muscular body of the Genie. She had everyone laughing when she accepted her coupons and broke into an improvised dance when someone played “A Friend Like Me” on a bluetooth speaker.

\--

Baekhyun was, once again, driven by his mom to Minseok’s party, claiming that he wanted to make his grand entrance by himself when he walked through the crowd at the house. He had to give it to Minseok hyung; even after having graduated last year, he still held one of the most packed parties Baekhyun had ever seen.

He heard various gasps and _woah_ ’s when he entered the house in his Mummy costume. Fairy lights were scattered around his body and a creepy makeup his mom helped apply under the bands around his face made him look.... He wasn’t going to admit that he’d been planning the costume for months but everyone would’ve assumed, as Baekhyun always took the extra mile with his costumes. Just the year before, he came dressed as a vampire, two different colored contacts on his eyes and an expensive pair of prosthetic fangs on his teeth.

Sehun, Jongdae and Chanyeol clapped when he finally found them on the backyard. They were standing next to an ugly pink flamingo figure that Junmyeon had given Minseok as a gift years ago. The two of them had drinks in their hands, save for the latter, who said he didn’t want to repeat what happened last time.

“ _That_ is more what I was expecting from you,” Chanyeol said.

“I told you I was saving the best for later.”

“The makeup looks sick.”

“Thanks.” he smiles at him.

Sehun cleared his throat. “Now that you’re here, Baekhyun hyung, I have a present for all of you.”

“Oh no…” Jongdae exclaimed. 

The younger ignored his hyung's protests, as per usual, and extracted from his pocket a… cigarette.

“We don’t smoke, Sehun.” Chanyeol’s muffled voice came from under his mask.

Sehun shook his head. “This is a _joint._ ”

His friends blinked at him.

“Weed.”

“The moment Peter Pan offers you weed you know you childhood’s ruined.” Jongdae deadpanned.

“Oh, _come on._ I’m doing this for you, hyungs!”

“Are we supposed to be excited to become drug-addicts?” Baekhyun asked him,

“It’s just a one time thing!” he exclaimed, joint still held in the air between them. “It’ll be a great experience.”

“Have you ever done it?”

“No. But Yukhei has.”

Baekhyun widened his eyes. “He’s like _fifteen._ ”

“Yeah, but he’s Chinese.”

“What does that even mean?”

“I don’t know. Whatever. He said it’s fun and it’s _safe._ Let’s do it.” he pleaded to his friends.

“I don’t know, Sehunnie,” Chanyeol said. “We don’t fuck with drugs.”

“Chanyeol, you’ve done worse to yourself with the amount of alcohol you consumed at Seokjin’s party. And it’s not like we’re doing coke or something like that.”

His friends looked unconvinced but Sehun was not giving up.

“Jongin and Kyungsoo already agreed.” 

_“WHAT_?” all three of them asked at the same time.

“I convinced Jongin to convince Kyungsoo.” He shrugged. “Come on guyyyyys. Let’s do it. It’ll be fun.”

Jongdae shrugged. “Ah, fuck it. If Kyungsoo is doing it.”

“Are you kidding?” Baekhyun asked. Then he turned to Chanyeol in search for support, but the taller looked like he was really considering it. “Chanyeol you too?”

The other raised his shoulder. “I mean… It’s just one time. It’s Halloween and we can sleep here if you don’t want to come back home. It is a new experience.” he nudged Baekhyun on the arm.

Baekhyun just stared at his friends. To be honest, he didn’t want to be the killjoy of the group—that was Kyungsoo’s job. But if there’s something his mother warned him was not to mess with drugs—or sex—so he couldn’t help but feel reluctant at the idea. 

Still. 

He didn’t want to feel left out. And Chanyeol was right, it was a new experience. 

He rolled his eyes.

“Fine, I’ll do it. But if something happens I’m blaming Kyungsoo. He’s the President.”

  
  


He felt absolutely nothing at first, disappointed to the point where he was starting to think that maybe weed is just a placebo but then…. about _an hour_ later he started feeling it. He _really_ was feeling it. He found himself surprised at the thought that the feeling wasn’t very far from being drunk,but the type of drunkenness you experience just before you getting hammered. 

His body felt light and his face was numb by the permanent grin that settled on his face. His mouth felt incredibly dry. He couldn’t stop giggling at every little thing. Even at things he normally wouldn't find funny. Oh a fly flew by. _Giggles._ He accidentally bumped into someone and spilled his drink. _Giggles._ That someone was Kyungsoo, who tried to punch him in the arm in return but missed completely. They both started laughing together. 

Everything felt like being in a stop-motion film.

They found themselves next to the table, raiding all the snacks. Jongdae managed to find a huge bag of cheetos that he defended with his life, as he didn’t allow anyone to come near it, cradling it close to his chest as if it was a baby. Kyungsoo and Jongin went to the kitchen to get water, since the table only had different kinds of alcohol to drink and nobody wanted to go that route on their first trip.

“These cookies taste like ass.” Sehun said through a mouthful but didn’t stop from eating them.

“I think those are the one that Seulgi made.” Baekhyun said, grabbing the last cookie from the tray. He saw Chanyeol giving him puppy eyes—he had taken his mask off, letting it hang on his neck, as it had gotten too hot for him— and split the cookie in two, giving one half to Chanyeol . He bit the cookie and it _did_ taste gross but he was so hungry that he didn’t care.

“When have you tasted ass, anyway?” Jongdae asked, still cradling his Cheetos baby.

“Your mom’s.” Sehun said.

Jongdae looked so foul that the three of them couldn't help but burst into an uncontrollable fit of laughter. Chanyeol’s body convulsed violently before dropping to the ground, still laughing. Baekhyun was afraid that he was going to choke but he couldn’t do anything as he himself couldn’t stop laughing either. 

“Uhm, guys,”

They turned to see Minseok who was standing next to them with wide eyes.

“Did you eat the cookies from the pink container?”

“We only took two.” Baekhyun answered.

“They tasted like ass.”

“Yeah, well...” Minseok scratched his cheek, eyeing the the four of them carefully. He looked like it was unsure of what to say. “...Those were weed cookies.”

They all broke into laughter again.

Baekhyun thought he should be worried but he couldn’t stop laughing as he asked “Are we gonna overdose?”

“You cannot overdose on _weed._ Besides, you said you only had two...”

 _“And we smoked a joint._ ” Sehun half whispered half shouted as he let himself fall into Minseok’s shoulder, clinging to him like a koala.

“You what?” the older asked but he looked way, more amused than worried.

“It’s a secret, hyung,” Sehun said, pressing his pointer finger to his hyung's mouth. “Don’t tell Jumnyeon hyung.”

Minseok laughed at him. “It’s okay, just go sit on the couch. You'll probably fall asleep sooner or later.”

The four of them obeyed, following Minseok as he turned on the TV in the living room and gave the remote control to Jongdae— which was a horrible idea— who only stopped cruising through the channels when he saw Titanic playing. 

“There are no subtitles.” he pouted.

He didn’t change the channel so they kept watching the movie. They didn’t really understand what the characters were saying but Baekhyun had seen the movie a couple of times before, so he at least knew what it was about. He, Chanyeol and Sehun sat on the floor, backs resting on the sofa. Jongdae was still clutching to his bag of cheetos, laying on the loveseat. Jongin and Kyungsoo came a couple of minutes later, handing them bottles of water that Minseok had sent their way. Jongin was also eating from a small box of gummy bears Baekhyun’s not sure where it came from but from which he took a couple candies anyway.

He really didn’t care much for the movie but he couldn't glace away from it, almost kike being in a trance. However, he supposed it had more to do with young Leonardo DiCaprio than with the weed.

After _who knows how long_ of watching in silence as the ship crashed into the iceberg and the movie started getting more and more depressing, Sehun spoke.

“I wish Vivi was here. He’s the best dog.” 

Jongin spoke from where he was sprawled on the couch above him. “I wish I was a dog. Maybe I wouldn't have to be watching this boring ass movie.”

“What the _fuck_? This is so sad!” Jongdae whined at the screen but still didn’t change the channel despite having the remote in his hand. 

“If I was an animal I would like to be something cool. Like-like a mammal.” Chanyeol rested his head on Baekhyun’s shoulder.

He frowned.

“Chanyeol, you _are_ a mammal.” 

The taller boy moved his head from his shoulder very slowly and looked at Baekhyun, completely terrified. _“What the fuck?”_

“Yeah, hyung. What the fuck? That is _so rude._ ” Sehun whispered, looking bewildered as well.

Baekhyun stared at the ground, conflicted about whether he knew or not what a mammal was but halfway through, his train of thought dissipated and he forgot what he was thinking about as he focused on a weird spot on the carpet. Chanyeol nuzzled his neck again, whispering _‘Baekhyunnie’_ in his pulse point. He suddenly felt like he couldn’t breathe. He blamed it on Chanyeol being pressed against him and on the fairy lights he was wearing around his whole body.

“No. _No._ NO!” Jongdae’s voice startled him. Kyungsoo, who had remained quiet the whole time, threw a cushion at him but the boy didn’t even flinch as it hit his head. “THEY BOTH FIT.”

“I wonder if Yixing feels like this all the time.” Jongin questioned.

Baekhyun looked at him confused. “Yixing smokes weed?”

“No, he’s just naturally in a perpetual daze.” Kyungsoo answered him.

“I bet Yixing has seen nirvana.” Jongin said again.

“But they separated before he was even born…” Chanyeol said, looking completely lost.

“I bet Yixing _is_ nirvana.” Sehun deadpanned.

“What does _that_ even mean?” Baekhyun asked for the second time that night.

“He died—HE FUCKING DIED,” Jongdae continued screeching. “HE—No— THEY BOTH FIT IN THERE!”

At some point, Minseok decided he had enough of Jongdae's wailings—thank god— and walked over to him to take the remote from his hands. He opened the Youtube app on the TV and said

“Karaoke time.” 

Baekhyun heard people cheering but a thought appeared in his mind and he had to blink a couple of times not to lose it.

_Yixing._

He got up from the ground. He heard Chanyeol ask him where he was going but he didn’t answer. He felt like he needed to move right in that exact second or he was going to forget the thought altogether. _Yixing._

He wasn’t even sure that he boy was in the party. He must be, right? He hadn’t seen him all day. He wasn’t at school. He extracted his phone from where he had buried it under his bandages and tried really hard to concentrate on what he was doing. _Yixing._

He thought. _What about Yixing?._ He stared at the phone in his hand. _What am I doing?._ He kept staring at the phone. He forgot. _Focus, Baekhyun. Phone. Who? who?_ He tried to wind back on the conversations. He felt like he was having short-memory loss. _Vivi. Dog. Mammal. Chanyeol. Chanyeol?_ He kept staring at the phone, hoping the device was going to give him the answers. _What about Chanyeol? He’s ripped._ He giggles at the thought. He stumbled out into Minseok’s backyard, where the night started. _Focus. Chanyeol. Not Chanyeol. Chanyeol? What?_ He spotted the ugly flamingo figured planted on the ground. _Sehun. Weed... Yixing smokes weed? Nirvana… Yixing!_ he quickly went on to the call button and called the chinese boy. _Quickly, before I forget._

Thankfully, Yixing answered on the second ring.

 _“Baekhyun, hi!”_ he greeted merrily over the phone.

“Hey!” Baekhyun said. “Did you come to Minseok’s party?”

_“I did! Where are you?”_

“You weren’t at school today.”

 _“Ah… no,”_ he chuckled nervously. Baekhyun thought it was cute. _“I had something planned.”_

“Yixing I miss you,” he whined on the phone. “Where are you?”

_“I’m in the backyard! Where are you? What are you dressed as?... Are you drunk? You sound funny.”_

“I’m in the backyard too!” Baekhyun scanned the place. It was spacious but not big enough for him to miss the other boy if they were both outside. 

And sure enough, Baekhyun found him. He was dressed as Superman, clad in a blue bodysuit with a red cape, a lone curl falling in the middle of his forehead. He had his phone to his ear as he looked around for Baekhyun still.

“I see you,” Baekhyun giggled into the phone.

 _“Really? Where are you?”_ Yixing kept looking around. Baekhyun thought that he probably wouldn’t recognize him under the bandages and the make up. He was about to yell at him to catch his attention when a girl walked up to Yixng. She had blonde hair and was dressed as Wonder Woman. 

Baekhyun frowned “Who’s that?”

The girl started pulling at Yixing’s hand, taking him away from the backyard.

“I have something to tell you…” Baekhyun said, before he saw Yixing disappear inside the house. He could hear music from his side of the line. Someone was singing loudly.

 _“Me too!”_ Yixing shouted. _“Listen, I’m going to hang up. I can’t hear very well. I’m inside the house but I have to go soon.”_

“Noooo, Yixing. I have something to tell you.”

_“Don’t worry. We’ll see each other tomorrow. I sent a message on the group chat, we’re going for dinner tomorrow. I’ll tell you there and you can tell me too! I have to go now, Baek. Love you. See you tomorrow!”_

“Love you…” Baekhyun whispered as the line went flat on the other side.

The rest of the party went on less wildly. He still had fun and he had to give it to Sehun because _this_ was really an experience. After spending twenty minutes sitting on the grass thinking about—and regretting—every life decision he had ever made, a way more sober and awake Kyungsoo found him and brought him back inside the house where the party was raging on.

Apparently, the makeshift karaoke stunt had been a hit and people were excitedly surrounding the living room as turns were taken to pick a song and give their best at performing. When entering the house, Baekhyun was surprised to see Junmyeon and Sehun singing an old ABBA song at the top of their lungs. Soon after, he and Kyungsoo gave their own rendition of Don’t You Want Me by The Human League, which received a loud round of applause—and a betrayed scoff from Park Jiyeon who seemed to have just discovered the golden treasure that was Kyungsoo. Even Chanyeol gave a try to Taeyang’s Eyes, Nose, Lips and left everyone cackling at his attempts to do a falsetto, but he laughed along nevertheless.

When Minseok, the caring angel that he was, drove them back to their respective houses, Baekhyun could not argue that he had a great time. However, it didn’t change the fact that there was something in him stirred in the wrong direction. Something that had left the inside of his mouth sour with uncertainty—and maybe a little jealousy—since he saw Yixing leave the party, pulled by the giggling Wonder Woman.

He didn’t have to wait much longer to figure out what it was. Yixing texted everyone to meet him at their prefered restaurant slash hangout spot, In the form of an old dinner inspired by 80’s movies. It had black and white checkered floors and the best milkshakes in Korea while still being affordable by high school students. All the food was greasy but delicious and perfect for starved teenagers after a day of practice or just a long week of exams. It only made him a little bitter that he was on a diet and couldn’t really order anything but _water_. Yet his mind was so preoccupied with something else that he didn’t even complain… that much.

Baekhyun and the rest of the gang sat in one of the booths next to the windows and with a perfect view of the front door, which Baekhyun had been intensely staring at waiting for Yixing to come in and tell them his exciting news. 

They had just finished ordering—everyone but Baekhyun—when he finally spotted Yixing’s head poking through the double doors. He smiled brightly at him when he finally located them but his smile slowly faded as Yixing got closer, a smiling girl trailing behind him, holding his hand.

“Who the fuck is that?” he couldn’t help but say and Junmyeon gave him a reproaching look, followed by a sigh of relief when he saw that Yixing and the girl still weren’t close enough to hear.

It was the Wonder Woman girl from the party. Holding his hand. Standing next to them.

Junmyeon, Jongdae and Minseok scooted aside so they could both sit on the booth. Baekhyun only thought that if the booths were already small and tight for the nine of them it was for sure overcrowded right now. Sensing this, both Yixing and Jongin pulled some chairs to place on either sides of the booth, leaving the girl to sit right across from him.

_Great._

“Guys, this is Wendy—”

“Who?”

“My girlfriend.”

“Your _what?”_

Baekhyun blinked in disbelief. 

Everyone seemed happy merrily introducing themselves to her, but all he could do was sit there, watching everything in slow-motion, feeling like someone had just dropped a hundred pounds worth of rocks on top of him, crushing him and burying him under ground. The girl, Wendy, had dyed-blonde hair and rosy chubby cheeks that made her look like a doll. She smiled brightly, friendly as she introduced herself to each one of them. God, he hated her already.

“How—” he cleared his throat. “How long have you been together?”

“We’ve been going out for almost a month now,” Wendy said with a bright smile, unaware of the way Baekhyun was plotting her murder in his mind. “But Yixing just asked me last night to be his girlfriend.”

“We met at Seokjin’s party. Wendy is new at school, she just moved from Canada.”

“Woah, Canada is great.” Minseok said. 

“Yes, it is. Are you planning on going back?”

“Uhh…” She was confused at Bakehyun’s question, but still answered politely. “I guess I will come back to visit in summer, after graduation.”

Wendy, per request of the others, kept talking about herself. She told them about her time in Canada and how she had to come back to Korea due to her parents' work. Baekhyun stopped listening to her. He stopped listening to _everything._ He was trying really hard not to choke on the lump that had formed on his throat, his face slightly contorting into a scowl as he tried, and failed, to smile for the sake of Yixing. His heart was beating very loudly when he first saw his crush enter that door with Wendy but it went completely silent. Like it had suddenly shut down. 

Pressing his hands into a fist, he stood up abruptly and, not minding that he interrupted Wendy’s story, he said “I-I have to go out. My mom’s calling.”

“Your phone is not—”

“Shut up Sehun.”

And with that, he excited the dinner quickly, going to the parking lot in the back, where he could not be seen through the window. He felt so _angry._ He thought heartbreak would be sad but he just felt anger. An unexplainable rage filled his body as he thought of Wendy and Yixing and _them, together._ And he didn’t understand why he wanted to scream and kick anything on his way.

He settled for kicking the trash bin nearby, yelping loudly when he felt a sharp pain in his foot.

“You shouldn't do that. You can’t run if you’re injured.”

He didn’t hear Chanyeol coming out. He didn’t look at him. Instead, he closed his eyes and tried to breath in, tried to control the fire that was burning from inside him like someone had injected him with gasoline and then made him swallow a match.

“It hurts so much.” he said after a while.

“Did you really hurt your foot with the trash bin?” he heard the concern in Chanyeol’s voice. He shook his head.

“No. Not my foot.”

“Oh.”

“I just…” he started, unsure of what he wanted to say. “I mean— who the fuck is she? She’s a stranger!”

“Not to Yixing…”

“How fucking dare she! She doesn’t belong with us in that booth, with her smile and stupid Canada and—

“Baekhyun stop.”

“And she’s ugly.”

“No, she’s not.” the tone in his voice had changed from concerned to severe, like he was about to reprimand Baekhyun. 

“No, she’s not,” Baekhyun admitted, bitterly. “She’s fucking beautiful. I bet she’s _so_ fucking nice too. _So_ perf—”

“Baekhyun stop, please. You’re not like this.”

“Like what?” he spat.

“Mean” Chanyeol said, walking closer to him. “I get that you’re sad. But don’t be like this. You’re being disrespectful to her and to _you friend_ without a reason _._ And I know you. You’re not like this.”

Baekhyun’s shoulders slumped. He closed his eyes. He didn’t want to stop being angry. Being angry was better than being sad and heartbroken and he didn’t want to let himself feel that. He felt his eyes water but he was not going to let tears spill. He didn’t want to. He didn’t want to feel so defeated. 

He knew that it was his fault. 

If he had confessed to Yixing before, maybe he’d be the one sitting next to him in that booth, squished in without altering the group. Maybe he’d be laughing and smiling and nothing would’ve changed. But he was a coward. He missed all the opportunities he had and now all there was left for him was to be angry for being so stupid. 

He wiped his eyes with the sleeve of his hoodie before they could run down from his cheek. He felt Chanyeol stepping closer and wrapping his arms around him in a tight hug. He didn’t hug back but let his head fall on his friend’s chest.

“I’m an idiot, Chanyeol.” he whispered.

“You’re not, Baek.” he caressed the back of his head, running his hand through his hair and Baekhyun already felt better with the comforting act. He smiled sadly at the warmth of Chanyeol’s embrace and at the heartwarming feeling that, despite him acting like an asshole, he was trying to cheer him up. 

“It’s just that…. it’s complicated. I know you’re hurt. Believe me, I know that feeling. But all you can do now is be happy for Yixing because he’s happy and he is _still_ your friend.”

Baekhyun wanted to ask _who_ , who had dared make Chanyeol feel like this, because he was ready to fight them and anyone who hurt Chanyeol deserved a punch to the face,but before he could ask, he heard someone walking towards them and of course, _of course,_ it had to be Yixing. 

“Hey, what’s going on?” Baekhyun hated that he could _hear_ how genuinely concerned Yixing was. 

“Baek, are you okay?” he asked but Baekhyun couldn’t look at him. He felt like if he did, he would start sobbing and he was not ready to explain why. He didn’t think there’ll ever be a time that he’d be ready to do it anymore. He just pressed his head closer to Chanyeol’s chest and wished to disappear.

“He’s okay. He’s just throwing a tantrum because he’s on a diet and can’t get a milkshake.”

“Oh, no,” Yixing said, obviously believing the lie. “Maybe we can ask if they can make a low-carb version?”

“Yixing, milkshakes are literally just ice cream, milk and sugar.” Chanyeol started and Baekhyun could’ve chuckled at the way he sounded, talking as if addressing a child, but he was afraid of any sound that might come out of him at that moment. “The low-carb version of it would be a glass of milk.”

“ _Oh.”_ Yixing sounded like he _just_ discovered what a milkshake was. “That’s unfortunate.” 

“We’ll come back in a minute, don’t worry.”

They didn’t come back after that. 

Chanyeol drove him back to his house and texted them from Baekhyun’s phone that his mom called and was angry, demanding him to come back because she found out that he had broken one of her vases sneaking in last night. It was all a lie of course but they all believed it as they have already witnessed in the past Baekhyun’s mom’s protectivity over her antic vases, so nobody questioned the sudden urgency.

Once in Baekhyun’s house, Chanyeol accompanied him to his room, put on a disney movie on his laptop and caressed his back as he cried on his lap.

\--

The thing about Yixing having a girlfriend was that the pain did not leave him once he heard the heartbreaking news. It was actually continuous, like a dagger digging again and again and _again_ in his chest and all Baekhyun could do was stand there and try to take it without flinching once.

Wendy was everywhere.

She was at their table in the cafeteria on most days—the days that she was not, Yixing was at _hers._ She was in his biology class, turning his favorite subject into bitter hours staring at the back of her head with murderous glares. She was at their hang-out spots, getting along with his friends, clinging onto Yixing’s arm and laughing at something that Jongdae said or having a deep meaningful conversation with Junmyeon. She even laughed along Chanyeol since the two had some weird similarities— loud laughter, flailing limbs everywhere and huge, bright smiles— Baekhyun had to physically restrain himself from launching himself at her like a wild cat when he saw her slapping Chanyeol in the arm as they both choked on ugly laughter because _no,_ she already had Yixing, the love of his life, and now she tried to take his best friend too? What was next? His spot as the captain of the track team? His house?

Weeks passed by, and although he tried his best to keep her in distance from his friends, keeping her out of the way meant keeping Yixing away too and even if it hurt him, Chanyeol was right when he said that Yixing was his friend and all he could do was be happy for them. So instead of trying to keep the girl the furthest possible from his group, he ended up pulling himself to the side, using all of his free time in practicing, running and getting faster. And when he was not doing any of that, he was with Chanyeol studying. The younger took pity on him and allowed study-breaks playing video-games with him, even with the full knowledge that he was nowhere near as skilled as Baekhyun and he always ended up losing. 

Baekhyun knew he was acting like a spoiled kid, wanting to hog all the toys in the playground and to mark them with a “B”, but he had always been a sore loser. Specially when it came to things that really mattered for him like _love_ and _friends_ and _pride._

At this point, Baekhyun was just trying to count the days till graduation so he could be done with everything, especially Yixing and _Wendy._

He didn’t think he’d be as thrilled for the competitions. All the rage and hurt inside him turned into willpower and he was feeling confident, shivering with anticipation. And before he even knew it, the Regionals were already around. 

People started filling up the bleachers around the running track and although track wasn’t necessary the most popular sport, the stadium was really packed that night . He supposed it was mostly due to Jungkook’s fan club. The boy was only a sophomore but he was very popular with the girls around school and Baekhyun had to admit he was actually a pretty good runner too. He was expected to replace Baekhyun as the team leader and honestly, he felt pretty confident in Jungkook’s abilities. He was fast, he was passionate and he was dedicated. He could be _a little_ too passionate sometimes, forcefully driven by stamina and a force he probably wasn’t aware he possessed but Baekhyun had been the same when he first joined the team in his sophomore year. He was as fast as an arrow but also a mass of flailing limbs running wildly and moving anything on his way, no matter what or _who._ Chanyeol constantly reminded him of that time he had come to watch his practice and turned into the only witness (besides the team) of how Baekhyun had been so focused on running that he didn’t slow down on time and crashed forcefully onto Coach Kim. The trainer had been in the middle of the track, probably expecting him to stop at the finish line like he was supposed to, but Baekhyun was too deep into his own world (he drifts to when running) and before he knew it, he collided with the older man. 

Poor Coach had to be taken to the emergency room in fear of a concussion. Thankfully, it was just the whiplash of the impact and nothing severe happened besides a scratched elbow and an embarrassing situation that will haunt him the rest of his teaching days.

For now, Baekhyun was crouching in his station. It was the last round. 

He was waiting for Jungkook—who had just started after Jimin— to reach him and pass him the baton, a strategic move to have him be the one to finish the circuit and probably to put him under the spotlight he needed for the scholarship. He had been confident the whole competition. He had been fast. Jinyoung was right on his heels but Baekhyun still had the heads up. 

On the last lap, the tension was building up; he could feel every drop of sweat on his forehead and his heart was thundering fast and heavy. 

From the corner of his eye, he could see Jinyoung next to him. He knew that the other boy was staring intensely at him. Being each other’s nemesis at that moment, he knew that the other was trying to instigate fear, dominance or whatever in Baekhyun to throw him off. However, he refused to look at him. He was not going to let himself be intimidated. Not when he had been slaving himself for the past months for this, both physically and academically.

Instead, he focused on Jungkook’s figure growing bigger as he got closer and in a split second, the baton was in his hand and he was running as fast as he could. Yugyeom had reached Jinyoung just a second later but that was enough to grant Baekhyun the headstart and he was a few meters ahead of Jinyoung.

He was not going to sing victory yet as Jinyoung was very fast and, in no time, was already stepping on his heels. Baekhyun pushed faster but from his peripheral vision, he saw Jinyoung stepping parallel to him, head to head. He used all of his willpower and strength to push, to run, run, _run._ His legs were already so tired, used to exhaustion, and sweat was running down his nose and his eyes. He could hear the chants of his name among the crowd and the finish line was just before his eyes…

And then it was over.

He broke through the band, running way ahead as he tried to slow down, like a car being abruptly stopped and drifting uncontrollably. He finally stopped, falling on his knees and rolling on his back.

He could hear the crowd screaming loudly but he could not make out the words.

His team reached up to him. Jimin, Jungkook and Minhyuk were standing above him, yelling excitedly, but he was still buzzed on adrenaline and exhaustion.

“BAEKHYUN!” Chanyeol’s face suddenly appeared above him, with that huge radiant smile that made him somehow look both incredibly creepy and incredibly attractive somehow. He hoisted him up “YOU WON!”

“I won?” he asked slowly, as if he suddenly woken up from a daydream.

“BAEKHYUN YOU WON!” Chanyeol lifted him up, bridal style, spinning him around like the wings of a helicopter.

“Put me down, you giant! I’m going to be sick,” he said but he was smiling too bright to sound threatening. 

Chanyeol did as he was told and Baekhyun finally took a moment to let the news settle in as his parents and the rest of his friends neared the track field.

He won.

Minhyuk and Jungkook were carrying him up by the legs and Jimin was running around happily like a labrador. His mom and dad were smiling happily at him, shouting and clapping as he was carried around like a pharaoh. When he finally managed to be let down—and avoided anymore manhandling—he hugged them back and let his mom kiss him on the cheek, even though they were in front of everyone, he was too happy to care.

Minseok and Junmyeon had managed to come around and were congratulating him. Jongdae tried to congratulate him too but got distracted by the sight of Jongin ugly crying next to him as he told Baekhyun how proud he was. Kyungsoo was smiling brighter than he had seen in a while and Sehun had managed to bring the party popper back and was firing it wildly.

He let himself enjoy the high of his bliss when Chanyeol pulled him into the tightest hug and the warmth that spread around his body couldn’t be shadowed even by the unwelcomed sight of Yixing jumping around with Wendy and then dipping her down into a dramatic kiss. He was not going to let her take this moment too,so he just looked away and found solace into the contagious brightness of the taller man beside him, holding him by the waist as his friends and family chanted his name.

\--

After winning of the track competition, a great weight had been lifted from Baekhyun’s chest. He still had to keep studying to keep up his GPA and ace the admission exams but with the Christmas break coming near he allowed himself to be distracted.

Chanyeol’s birthday had been a few days before the competition. All of the group had agreed beforehand to not give each other presents on their birthdays since they were a really large group and opted instead to save the money and invest it in a vacation together to Jongdae’s uncle’s village in Jeju, as a graduation trip. 

Despite it being something everyone agreed on, Baekhyun felt guilty for not giving his best friend anything, especially after how much he had helped him this semester. So he decided to invest in a nice late birthday slash christmas present that he knew would make him happy. 

That’s how he found himself in the shopping mall, first week of Christmas break, in Momo’s Magic Music Shop (that name was a handful) looking for the perfect present for his friend. Chanyeol’s love for music was no secret. The boy was kind of a kid prodigy,he played six instruments _plus_ he was/being very good at singing— despite no one knowing but Baekhyun himself—so Baekhyun knew that something music related was always a great option. Except Baekhyun knew absolutely nothing about music himself and felt completely lost in the shop. Looking at the numerous displays of instruments and old records, nothing really ‘tickled his fancy’ but at the same time, he was a bit unsure of what he was looking for.

He was busying himself, looking through the racks of cd’s near the front door, with nothing particularly catching his eyes, when his chest collided with a figure coming through the entrance.

“I’m sorry, I wasn’t look—Yixing!” 

“Oh, Baek!” the chinese boy greeted him with a dimpled smile and a hug. It was less than a week since the last time they saw each other but Yixing never passed an opportunity to hug. 

“What are you doing here?” he asked curiously.

“I came to pick up Wendy’s christmas gift.” 

“Oh.”

“What about you?”

“Uhm…” Baekhyun felt his cheeks warm at the question. “I was actually looking for something for Chanyeol…” He answered, rubbing the back of his neck.

“Ah, I see.” Yixing gave him a knowing look. “What are you getting him?”

He looked back at the racks with a pout. “I don’t know, I’m not sure. I don’t really feel like anything here is for him?”

Yixing nodded, understanding, then patted him on the arm. “Come to the back with me.”

Baekhyun gave him a puzzled look but followed him nevertheless. It wasn’t like he could say no to him anyway. 

He followed Yixing across the store until they reached the counter. The boy behind the cashier machine—who looked incredibly bored— only nodded at them in acknowledgement before Yixing was pushing a wooden door, Baekhyun trailing behind him.

They entered a small room that looked like a waiting room, with a leather sofa next to the door and another door that said “employees only” across from it. In the back, there was a wall full of hanging guitars. All had different colors and interesting designs painted on them. Baekhyun looked curiously at them. 

“Ah, Yixing,” the head of a man was peeking through the employees’ door. “You’re on time, we just finished with yours. Let me bring it.” and then he was gone again.

Baekhyun looked at Yixing with questioning eyes.

“They paint these here,” he explained “they are commissions only but I thought you might be interested. For Chanyeol.”

“Oh. Yeah. That’s great.” 

Baekhyun reached the wall displaying the guitars. There were many of them with all those interesting-looking styles. A variety of acoustic and electric ones. There were some that were colorful and exotic, creative patterns and combinations imprinted on them, while some others were more subdued, with only one color or maybe just simple letters on them.

Then there was one particular guitar that caught his eyes. It was an electric one, matte black. It was apparently humble, elegant looking with the matte texture but had some small details in silver dots and lines. A constellation. It was beautiful. 

“Here you go.” the store clerk was back. He handed Yixing his guitar. It was a normal acoustic one but it had beautiful sunflowers and other types of flowers painted all over it. Baekhyun’s chest cooed at the thoughtful gift and then ached at the knowledge that it was for someone else.

“Hey, can I see this one?” Baekhyun asked him.

“Yeah, sure.” the guy said, walking over to pick the guitar and hand it to him. “This one is up for sale actually. The client never came to pick it up, it’s been over two months so the guarantee is over.”

“Really?” He asked excitedly. The guitar was perfect, almost as if he had asked for it himself. Then he turned to the price tag.

He had to stop himself from screeching.

The price was a little more that double of what he had been planning on spending on the gift. He ran his hands through it. It was really perfect and he could almost see Chanyeol’s face smiling brightly at it. 

He sighed.

He supposed he could save up a bit longer.Or ask for money from his mom in case it wasn’t enough by the graduation.

“I’ll take it.”

  
  


Yixing had invited Baekhyun for coffee, both of them holding their new guitars in huge bags with christmas designs. They talked while they waited in line at the coffee shop. It was incredibly busy and Baekhyun just wanted to push all the people aside so he could order his hot chocolate. 

They chatted about nothing in particular. From school, parties and graduation to Christmas, Baekhyun was doing as much as possible to keep the conversation from Wendy but failed completely as his love struck friend kept bringing her up in every situation.

“So are you going back to China for the break?”

“Yes. I’m leaving next week,” Yixing answered. He could see the ebullience in his face at the idea of going back to his hometown. “Wendy is coming along.”

“Fu—r-really?”

“Yeah, I know it’s a bit soon. We’ve only been dating for a couple of months but I want her to meet grandma.”

“That’s lovely, Yixing.” Baekhyun said with a smile, ignoring the tightness in his chest.“Grandma’s approval is always important.”

  
“Yeah. Does your grandmother like Chanyeol?”

“Uh, yeah,” Baekhyun answers, a little confused at the question. To be honest, he was kind of used to Yixing’s randomness so he didn’t put much thought into it. “She loves him, actually. He played her favorite song for her on the piano once and I’m afraid she likes him more than me ever since.” he smiled fondly at the memory, despite his words.

“Aw, don’t say that, Baek. I’m sure there’s enough love in her for the two of you.”

They both kept chatting after ordering, Baekhyun finally getting the hot chocolate he needed for his chattering cold bones.  
  


\--

Baekhyun groaned internally at the thought of having to keep saving for more time. It was easy when he was dieting for the competition and saved up all the money he would’ve spent in milkshakes and snacks. Since that was over, saving was more difficult as his only restraint was his will.

It was still worth it though.

When he met Chanyeol two days after Christmas and presented him with the gift, Chanyeol’s eyes had gone wide and his ears turned incredibly red.

“I didn’t get you anything.” he said embarrassed.

“It’s alright. It’s a thank you for being the most amazing person ever and a great friend.” Baekhyun told him.

Some unknown spark flashed through the taller's eyes for a split second before he started unwrapping the huge box Baekhyun had given him. 

_It was all worth it_ , Baekhyun thought, smiling to himself when Chanyeol lifted the guitar in his hands, holding it like it was something precious. He’d been so excited that he hugged Baekhyun to the point where the smaller was gasping for air but still didn’t complain.

A warm fuzzy sensation settled in his stomach. A feeling that just had him smiling like an idiot as he watched his best friend play a few random chords and then looked up at Baekhyun with the biggest loving smile ever.

\--

Christmas break was over sooner than expected. In fact, Baekhyun was beginning to feel like the school year was just zooming through and it scared the hell out of him. Everything was moving too fast and he felt like his senior year was absolutely nothing like what he had expected it to be.

Although his actual situation wasn’t what he had envisioned at first—everything really seemed to have taken an 180-turn - _it was not like he had a clear plan in the first place._ To be honest, he hadn’t even given in to the idea of looking for college before but worked hard and earned an opportunity in door and he couldn’t be more thankful for that. His mom had been pretty excited for him when he told her the news after the competition. Even his dad, the stoic authoritative figure of a cop, looked excited and patted him on the back affectionately. 

Senior year had, so far, been… good. Certainly not great. But good. There were parties almost every weekend—seniors were insatiable— and the social part was _good._ He’d been hanging out with his friends and enjoying their company, despite the unwanted presence of Wendy every now and then. Hell, Sehun convinced him to try weed and if that wasn’t surprising enough, he also convinced Kyungsoo. That was a story that would stay engraved in everyone’s memories for the rest of their lives. 

Yet, still, a little part of him was waiting for something. Like a grand finale in a typical high-school movie. Like the prospect of finding his true love (even if he was still convinced it was Yixing. Who else could it be but him? All he could do about the situation anyway was to wait around for him and pretend it didn’t hurt his heart). Baekhyun felt like he could even accept breaking into a complicated choreography at the end of graduation as they sang about their feelings and fears. He wanted to go, leave high school with a BANG. After all, didn’t they say that high school years were the best years of one’s life? So far he’d only had the _okay_ years. He didn’t like the idea of this part of his life being so uneventful, so insignificant. He wanted more, he needed more. 

And more came.

It came on Valentine’s Day, of all days, in the form of a small piece of red paper folded in half, hidden away in his locker under an _unexpected_ box of chocolates. Strawberry filled, his favorites, he noted. 

To be honest, he was not expecting to get anything on Valentine’s Day. He had never gotten anything before (except, maybe, one _nasty_ hentai drawing by none other than Lee Junhui and Baekhyun would much rather pretend that _that_ never happened),so he took the note carefully, trying to not show how much it filled him with inquisitiveness that made his face feel as red as the paper itself. 

He inspected the box first. On its front was the picture of nice, fancy chocolates, with delicious filling oozing of one of them, but nothing more. The only thing that linked it to the note was a red ribbon hooked underneath the box. 

The paper had nothing on the front. _Anonymous._ And when Baekhyun unfolded it very carefully, there were only a few lines printed on it. Nothing else. 

_Like the moon I keep lingering around you._

_Will you notice me?_

Baekhyun smiled unknowingly. It was short but so sweet. He felt butterflies making a riot in his stomach as he put the note into his pocket, wanting to have it near him for the rest of the day.

“Hey.”

“Hey Chanyeol.” Baekhyun said with a dazed smile.

“You look happy.” the other noted, eyeing Baekhyun curiously with a sly smile on his face. 

He shrugged, not bothering to deny it. “It’s a nice day. Got anything for Valentine’s?”

Chanyeol held up a small pink bag of what looked like homemade cookies. “They’re from a first grader. Want one? They’re really good.”

“Chanyeol, that’s your gift!” Baekhyun smacked him on the arm but took one of the cookies either way, moaning at the taste. “Damn, that is really good.”

The taller man raised a hand, swiping his thumb over the corner of Baekhyun’s mouth, where a trace of powdered sugar had remained. Baekhyun felt his face grow red at the small action and flickered his gaze away while he finished the pastry. 

“What about you? Did you get anything?” the other asked, nudging him with his elbow.

“A box of chocolates. I don’t know who they’re from, though.”

“Just that? Nothing else?”

“Yep.” Baekhyun looked away, unable to hide his smile. He knew that the taller boy could tell that he was lying but he didn’t care. It’s not like he didn’t want to tell him, it’s just that he wanted to keep the little mystery to himself for a little longer. 

When he turned back to his friend, he found Chanyeol still staring at him, trying to conceal a nervous smile by biting his lip. Baekhyun looked up to his friend’s round eyes, unable to understand the feelings swirling in them. When he opened his mouth to speak, Chanyeol only pushed another cookie into his mouth and turned away. 

The suspiscious moment broke when they heard two screaming voices nearing them. Sehun and Jongdae were screeching,—no wonder Kyungsoo didn’t want to talk to the group in the hallways; Baekhyun had to admit, they were _loud_ — jumping up and down, smiling enthusiastically and looking as if they won the lottery. They were so happy that he was almost afraid of what was going to happen next.

“I deserve a fucking Oscar.” Sehun announced, holding his hands up in the air.

“YOU’RE NOT GONNA BELIEVE THIS,” Jongdae held Chanyeol by the shoulders, shaking him furiously. He had a tendency of not realizing when he was louder than a normal human being, which was, mostly all of the time.

“I’m a fucking MASTER!” Sehun did a funny noodle dance in the middle of the hallway. A few of the students passing by gave him a weird look but he did not care. His mood was still as blissful as someone who had found a hidden treasure. “I just captured an HISTORIC moment.”

“YOU’RE NOT GONNA BELIEVE THIS,” Jongdae was now holding Baekhyun’s shoulders, shaking him as he did with his other friend. 

“We might if you tell us.” he answered, blinking away the dizziness. Jongdae had more strength than what his scrawny body showed. 

The shorter one opened his mouth to speak but stopped as Sehun held out a hand. “No. let them _see_ for themselves.”

He lifted his camera—the one that had never left his hand for the past months — and passed it to Baekhyun. He felt Chanyeol perch his chin on his shoulder, as he looked at the camera, and even though Jongdae and Sehun had most likely seen whatever was in there, they both stood behind him to look too.

The video started what seemed to be the corner of a classroom on the top floor, looking down over the entrance of the school where a figure was resting against the thick stone railing of the stairs, focusing on a book in his hand, unaware, or more likely, uncaring of what was happening around them. It was Kyungsoo. The camera zoomed in and out a couple of times, trying to focus on the figure in the distance.

 _“Hyung, hyung, hyung,”_ Sehun said from behind the camera _“It’s happening. He’s coming.”_

Muffled sounds of someone shuffling behind were heard, followed by another voice that was clearly Jongdae’s. _“I don’t believe it.”_

_“Here we are, witnessing… love.”_

Then, another person entered the scene. Jongin,holding a pink box behind his body, was taking incredibly slow steps as he approached the unprepared Kyungsoo. Once he reached the unsuspecting boy, Jongin placed the box right in front of him. The owl eyed boy looked up from his book, looking at the younger with a curious look. Jongin’s face was so red it could’ve been confused with a red spot on the lense. He said something that the camera obviously couldn’t catch due to the distance but it could still capture the feelings perfectly.

Whatever he had said, it clearly took Kyungsoo by surprise, the book in his hand dropping to the ground and his mouth gaping like that of a fish. Jongin presented the box to him, holding it out to his face as the younger kept his gaze on the ground. Kyungsoo took the box in his hands, holding it like it was made of crystal. Then he giggled. Do Kyungsoo fucking giggled.

_“Oh my God.”_

Kyungsoo carefully placed the box on the railing, setting it aside. Jongin looked scared for a split second, before the shorter was holding his face with both hands and leaning up on his toes to place a kiss on the younger’s lips.

The camera started shaking furiously, as if the person holding it started jumping up and down. Which was probably the case.

_“WOAAAH!”_

_“OH MY GOD, OH MY GOD.”_

_“I GOT IT ON VIDEO.”_

_“What in the world is this ruckus?”_

The rapid movement stopped suddenly and the camera swung around to capture the face of a bewildered profesor entering the empty classroom,his wide eyes focusing on the two guys behind the camera.

_“Oh shi—_

Then the video ended. 

Baekhyun looked up to his friends as if they had just presented him with the footage of Beyonce’s birth. Chanyeol was a mirror of his own expression, mouth agape, eyes widened in confusion, yet excitement in his gaze. 

He took Baekhyun by the shoulders. “Oh my God!”

The four of them started screaming and jumping around excitedly. Huge smiles on their faces, they were lost in the happiness they felt for their friends before being suddenly stopped when another profesor came, chastising them for the scandal. 

\--

Despite having an excellent morning, Baekhyun stabbed his chicken strips with bitter force, trying to redirect his focus on figuring out who the mystery person behind the red note could be rather than the scene happening a few tables to his right; Yixing, perched up on one of the tables, serenading a heart-eyed Wendy in the middle of the cafeteria.

Fucking cute. Lovely. 

“Hyung, that chicken is already dead.”

“I like it tender.” Baekhyun spat at Sehun, stabbing the meat a couple of times more, before shoving it into his mouth.

They were the only ones sitting in their usual table. Yixing was having his High School Musical moment—that Baekhyun was not jealous of _at all_ —, Jongin and Kyungsoo were having lunch on their own, doing what Sehun described as _making up for years of lost canoodling,_ and Jongdae was nowhere to be found. He had a secret life of his own, apparently. 

Chanyeol had gone for a snack to the vending machine and Baekhyun and Sehun were witness witnessed how he was approached by a short sophomore, with blushed cheeks and a glittery, cute card in his hands, as he made his way back. Chanyeol looked like he was taken back as he was intercepted by the boy. 

“Wow. Chanyeol has been very popular this year,” Sehun commented, not as impressed as his comment would suggest. 

“It’s the abs. They have everyone trailing after him.” Baekhyun answered and he hoped that it didn’t sound as sour as it did in his head. Clearly, that wasn’t the case as Sehun turned to him, a sleek black eyebrow raised in curiosity. 

“Did you get something?”

“A box of chocolates. It wasn’t signed, I don’t know who they’re from.”

Sehun scoffed, turning to his food. “Yeah, I wonder _who_ on earth they could be from.”

Baekhyun eyed him at the obvious sarcasm. “Is there anything you know that I don’t?”

The younger only smiled at him, as if the answer was obvious. “There are many things that I know and you don’t”

Baekhyun frowned. He wanted to ask what the hell that meant when his attention drifted to a boy standing behind Sehun. He was tall, almost as tall as Chanyeol—which was not the only features he shared with him, Baekhyun thought, taking in the boy’s big eyes and pouty lips. He was sure he’s seen him before but he couldn’t quite place him.

Sehun seemed to notice Baekhyun’s attention shifting and followed his gaze to the person behind him.

“Hey, Yukhei.” he greeted him.

 _Ah._ It was Sehun’s friend from the AV Club, Baekhyun recognized.

The boy didn’t answer. Instead, his eyes widened, doubled in their already big size and his lips pressed into a thin line. His face turned a deep shade of pink.

Baekhyun felt like he was witnessing a scene he was not supposed to but before he could move away, Yukhei shoved a small box with a red bow into Sehun’s chest and sprinted away. 

“Aww, Sehun. That is so cute.” Baekhyun said, as the hopeless romantic he was.

However, when the younger turned back, he looked the complete opposite of what Baekhyun was expecting.His jaw was set tightly and his gaze was hard. He looked so _angry_ but Baekhyun couldn’t tell why.

“Excuse me.” he said, uncharacteristically polite of the tall boy, then he rose up from his seat and left. Abandoning the gift he had just received on the table. 

\--

Baekhyun still couldn't understand what he had witnessed at lunch earlier. It left him with a weird sensation. After Sehun had basically ran away, Baekhyun had no choice but to take Yukhei’s gift with him. He didn’t want to imagine what the poor boy would feel if he just saw the little present he’d given him with what looked like all the courage he could muster, lying abandoned on the school table. It would break his poor heart. It was already breaking Baekhyun’s and he wasn’t even part of the equation. 

He found Sehun after class just as the boy was leaving for his house and Baekhyun gave him the forlorned present with a stern look, leaving the younger man no choice but to take it, reluctantly still. 

Later, he was walking next to Chanyeol towards the latter’s car. Having already explained the situation from earlier to him, Baekhyun frowned to himself as he kept thinking it over, along with all of the events that happened in this one single day. The chocolate box and the note, Kyungsoo and Jongin, Jongdae’s disappearance, his _not_ jealous fit over Yixing and lastly, Sehun’s unexpected coldness towards his friend’s confession. 

For some reason, Baekhyun couldn’t keep thinking about how, so far, every time was expecting to have a great day,it has only left him confused and displeased.

“What’s going on in your pretty head? I can almost see the smoke coming out of your ears.” Chanyeol asked as they walked.

“It was just a very strange day.”

“Why strange?”

“You know, the thing that I told you about Sehun. I felt kinda bad for the kid… Then the mysterious chocolate box…”

“Hey, uhm, about th—”

“Then Kyungsoo and Jongin—I don’t know. A lot of weird things happen.”

Chanyeol looked confused. “What’s weird about them?”

Baekhyun sighed as they reached the car. “I don’t know if weird is what I meant. It’s just that— what if Kyungsoo had reacted like Sehun did?”

“But he didn't.” Chanyeol stated.

“Yeah. And that’s great, I’m very happy for them. But it just leaves me wondering about all the _what ifs._ I mean, we’re friends. They’re friends.”

“W-what does t-that have anything to do?”

“I...I don’t know, Chanyeol… like, you see Yixing ditching us all the time now that he’s with Wendy. That’s what couples do! And now it’s gonna be Jongin and Kyungsoo and our group will be even more strained.” he ran a hand through his hair. “And what if they break up? Would they still be friends?”

“Are you saying you would’ve preferred if Jongin didn’t ask him out?” the taller asked. Baekhyun watched his face suddenly look… sad. Like he just had broken something inside him. He didn’t know that Chanyeol was that invested in their friends' relationship but he supposed it was normal since he had known both Jongin and Kyungsoo for longer than Baekhyun had. He must have known of their feelings longer than Baekhyun and feared that he didn’t share the same happiness for them.

“No, no… I don’t even know what I’m saying, honestly. I’m really happy for them, I really am,” he reassured him. “Maybe I just feel like so many things are changing so suddenly and I guess… I wasn’t ready.”

He glanced at Chanyeol again. He seemed to understand, nodding along, but Baekhyun still saw the little specs of sadness in his expression. He looked lost in a thought Baekhyun would never know and he felt guilty. He didn’t want Chanyeol thinking that he wasn’t supportive of his friends. That wasn’t the case at all.

Maybe he shouldn’t have opened his mouth at all.

“Hey…” he reached to take the taller’s arm. “Do you wanna play PUBG at my house?”

Chanyeol looked at him, taking a second a little too long to answer. “Uh.. I can’t. I have a-a thing.” he said, walking towards the driver door. Baekhyun mirrored the movement on the copilot side. 

“A thing… like a date?” he asked, ignoring the intrusive knot forming in his stomach.

“No! Not like that,” the taller said, without meeting his eyes. “I’m helping my sister with something.”

“You’re helping your sister with something on Valentine’s day?” he asked again, disbelieving, even though he didn’t really have a reason to distrust his best friend. If Chanyeol had a date he would tell him, right? “Alright, If you say so.”

“I can help my sister on any day, excuse you,” Chanyeol finally told him, breaking the minimal veil of tension that Baekhyun felt. “I’m a good brother.”

Baekhyun chuckled and rolled his eyes as he got in the car.

Although the conversation about Valentine’s and the occurrences of the whole day had been left behind on the parking lot and the drive towards Baekhyun’s house had resulted in small talk and lame jokes, Chanyeol still couldn't meet Baekhyun’s eyes, The shorter was left to wonder if he really had said something that could’ve upset him and to feel so incredibly guilty for something he had no idea about. 

\--

Baekhyun wasn’t sure if he was being victim of a prank or if he suddenly had joined the cast of the rom-com movie he so desperately wanted to be in, except without being the protagonist.

He was not part of the lead couple romance. That was Yixing, continuously swooping Wendy off of her feet with attentive gestures, love filled gazes and dimpled smiles.He was not even the secondary, unexpected romance of the co-protagonist. Those were Kyungsoo and Jongin who had not changed the flow of the group as much as Baekhyun had expected. Everything moved the same, except for how Baekhyun sometimes caught them sharing secretive glances across their lunch table, or how Kyungsoo blushed when Jongin intertwined their hands on as they walked through the hallways, or how Jongin threw enamoured stares every time Kyungsoo gave his dutiful announcements as class president. Everything was the same save for the secret little world his friends shared, the small sub-plot Baekhyun sometimes managed to sneak a peek of. He didn’t want to admit it but it was so freaking cute and they looked so happy that it made Baekhyun feel guilty of ever having an ounce of doubt. 

What he didn’t expect though, having already accepted his role of just an _extra_ standing beside the story, was the little red notes that kept appearing in his locker.

They weren’t there every day, but at least once a week.

And Baekhyun couldn't say his heart didn’t hop a little every time he found a new one, reading the sweet little words printed on them, making it almost impossible to know who they were from.

Baekhyun _ached_ to know. 

Yet at the same time, he liked the mystery. He liked the magic that came with them. He hadn’t told anyone about it, keeping it his not-so-dirty little secret. Although his friends were starting to get suspicious when he suddenly couldn’t stop his stupid loving smile from appearing on his face the days the found the notes. 

-

_The way you cry the way you smile,_

_How much meaning do they have to me!_

_-_

_I just want to make you love me_

_-_

_From the moment that I met you,_

_Not a single day has been ordinary_

_-_

_I love you a lot but_

_I don't say the word "I love you"_

_It's weird, my pride doesn't allow me_

_-_

Baekhyun hated how these little gestures from someone he _didn’t even know_ had such a strong effect on him. He didn’t have a single clue, yet he kept daydreaming thanks to the loving words on the papers. Anticipating the days as he waited for a new note to appear in his locker, fearing that they would stop if he didn’t find out soon who the messenger was.

\--

“Guys, I fucked up,” Chanyeol said as he sat beside Baekhyun on the bench.

It was only him and Jongdae this time and Baekhyun now longed for the days where they all could sit together and joke around. But everyone had their own personal agendas, the couples being… couples and Sehun had his newfound calling, wanting to be the great documentary man that captured everything around him. 

“ _I’m_ fucked up.” Chanyeol repeated, cradling his face in his hands.

“What did you do?” Baekhyun asked concerned, placing a hand on his best friend’s back, trying to console him.

“You heard about the senior prank thing, right?” Both boys nodded. “Well, I had a very stupid idea that seemed pretty good at the time. I… I…”

He groaned, letting his forehead fall on the table and murmured something.

“Isignedupkyungsootobepromking.”

“We didn’t catch that, Yeol.”

“I signed up Kyungsoo to be Prom King.”

If Chanyeol already felt stupid, the other two faces definitely weren’t helping at all. Both men looked at him completely in shock. Baekhyun tried to say something but couldn't find the words, his mouth opening and closing a few times. 

“Why would you do that?”

“I—I don’t know. I wasn’t thinking,” Chanyeol sat up, grimace still on his face. “It seemed like a good idea for a second. Like it could be a good prank? Kyungsoo to be announced as Prom King contestant and Jongin as Prom Queen….”

“Oh, Chanyeol, _no…”_

“I realized too late that it was a completely asshole thing to do. But I had already signed Kyungsoo up. I tried to take it back but Sooyoung wouldn’t let me change it. It’s—It’s like she could _smell_ what I was doing. She smirked and said that it was definitive.”

“Oh no.” Jongdae pinched the bridge of his nose. 

“And now Kyungsoo is going to kill me when he hears his name being announced.”

“He will.”

Chanyeol let himself fall down again, his head finding refuge on Baekhyun’s shoulder, the latter holding him closer, unsure of how to help his situation. He knew that Chanyeol would never try to be mean on purpose but he also knew that he was often prone to playing stupid pranks that backfired like sucker punches.

“What if… you don’t say anything?” Baekhyun offered. “Kyungsoo would be mad, sure, but he might get over it later….”

“Oh, no.” Jongdae raised one single finger at him. “ _No._ I’ve managed to remain unproblematic this whole school year, you can’t drag him into your mess, you oversized peanut-head monkey.”

“Jongdae…” Baekhyun pleaded, seeing how his best friend cringed at the words but didn’t contradict him.

Chanyeol looked at his friend, trying to give him his best puppy eyes, pleading desperately. Jongdae looked at him in disgust, unwavering for a moment and then rolled his eyes. 

“Fine. I won't say anything…but,” Chanyeol looks like he was about to drop at the floor and kiss his feet, before the other spoke again. “If Kyungsoo asks I’m not lying to him.”

“I’ll take it.” Chanyeol said, nodding his head. 

\--

It was a sunny day, oddly warm for being half-way through april, and Baekhyun hated that he decided to spent the day inside, studying for their stupid SATS.

Since both Track Season and Basket season were over, they both had more free time on their hands, which was used, much to Baekhyun dismay, to prepare for their admission exams. 

He knew they needed to study. No matter how confident they both might be outside their academic skills, he knew that they just couldn’t risk it by being overconfident. Nonetheless, Baekhyun hated studying with a burning passion. He hated anything that required him to sit still for a certain amount of time. So, exhaling his frustration, he put his pencil down and rested his chin on his hand. 

Chanyeol was aware of his constant needs for breaks, already gotten used to Baekhyun saying he was done for good around every twenty minutes, so at this point he didn’t even look up from the book he was reading, highlighting with his neon yellow marker the important parts he needed to remember for later. He knew that sooner or later Baekhyun would give another annoyed sigh and continue his studying with a pout, until he demanded they took a _real_ break and played some video game. 

Baekhyun observed his best friend. It wasn’t an odd thing to do. He spent so much time with Chanyeol that sometimes they both just nestled in a comfortable silence. He knew that the other observed him sometimes too. Baekhyun sometimes looked back and gave him a dopey look or blew a kiss, just to amuse him. It never failed to make the taller boy giggle and Baekhyun felt a strange sense of realization every time he could return the favor of making Chanyeol laugh. Ever since he met him, Baekhyun had never felt so comfortable in the presence of another person, even if they were just sitting in silence like then. Or had he ever felt so accomplished by just making his friend smile. Sometimes, he would wonder if there was such a thing like a platonic soulmate. If there was someone who was destined to be with you forever but not necessarily as a romantic partner. It seemed so easy that they were together. Like how the fit so well with one another, despite not knowing each other for as long as Chanyeol had known Kyungsoo or Sehun. 

He couldn't explain it, really. It was like something had gone off when they met. It was like a voice behind his ear told him ‘that’s gonna be your best friend’ and Baekhyun accepted it, welcoming Chanyeol happily to his life and adoring every second he’d been in it. 

“Why are you so perfect?”

They both were taken aback, the words leaving his mouth before the smaller had time to process them.

Chanyeol froze, blushing prettily. 

“I mean…”Baekhyun started again. “You’re great, Chanyeol. I’m really happy we met.”

“Is this because I’m helping you study?”

He shrugged, lips turning upward. “No one would put up with me for so long.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” Chanyeol smiled, eyes crinkling. “I’m great.”

Baekhyun crunched up a paper from his notebook and threw it at his friend’s head. The paper ball lamely hit Chanyeol on the temple and the other just laughed.

He reached and pulled Baekhyun into his chest, hugging only his upper body. “I would say I’m really happy to have met you too,” he said, bending down to place his lips to Baekhyun’s ear. The low grumble of Chanyeol’s deep voice sent a shiver through his body. “But you’re a brat.”

\--

A few days later, the announcements for the contestants for Prom King and Queen were made. 

Kyungsoo’s face was so red as he heard his name that he looked like a tomato with eyebrows. His eyes almost bulged out of his eyes as he stood up and gave a small polite bow. 

Chanyeol rose up from his seat discreetly and walked away, mumbling something about needing to go to the bathroom. 

\--

_I wanna be your favourite boy_

_I wanna be the one that makes your day_

_The one you think about as you lie awake_

\--

They were having a sleepover in Kyungsoo’s house that night. It had been a really long time since Kyungsoo agreed to host a party (or any other kind of social gathering) in his own home. But since his parents were going away for the weekend, it was an opportunity that couldn’t be missed.

It took a lot of convincing, a lot of promises of them being in their best behaviour and very little of Jongin fluttering his eyelashes at him and saying _please, babe_ , —no matter how cringey that was— to give Baekhyun the reward of a) having a gathering with his friends, all on their own after a long while and b) discovering Kyungsoo’s weakness to agree to anything.

It was a simple plan, go to Kyungsoo’s, watch a few movies, eat some delicious food and have a great time. It was even better when Chanyeol and Jongin came in with bags full of bottles of soju and beer—Yoora, Chanyeol’s sister, had agreed to buy them a few and in return Chanyeol had to cover for her the next time she wanted to sneak out with her boyfriend— and suddenly, it was the perfect day; hanging out with his friends he missed after all of them being so busy with studying and worrying about college and _relationships._

“It’s my turn to pick a movie,” Jongdae said, looking through Kyungsoo’s extensive collection of films. He was a renowned film enthusiast so they always had great variety whenever they did their movie marathons.

Jongdae held up the plastic box of the movie to show it to Baekhyun, kneeling next to him on the floor, who shook his head and dismissed the option. “Chanyeol cries with that one.”

“So what?” Jongdae retorted. “Chanyeol cries with everything.”

“Hey!” the taller boy hissed, trying to defend his honor. “I barely ever cry.”

“You cry a lot.” Baekhyun deadpanned. 

Chanyeol only gave him an offended look.

“You cried the other day while eating spicy food.” Sehun added from the sofa.

“It was _really_ spicy.”

Jongdae just rolled his eyes and kept looking through the box with Baekhyun on his shoulder to give his input on the movies.

When they finally settled on one, Jongdae put it in the DVD player while everyone gathered in the living room. It was still a bit early so they decided to eat after the first movie was over and kept drinking through the length of it. Baekhyun and Jongdae sat on the floor, their backs resting on the couch that Sehun and Chanyeol were lying on—which was, by the way, totally unfair as their long legs took literally all of the space—and Kyungsoo and Jongin were on the smaller coach, with the latter resting his head on his boyfriend’s legs.

They finished the first movie, which was not as good as the group had expected and Jongdae was almost banned from choosing movies again but he whined back that he had limited choices as the others he wanted to see would make Chanyeol _and_ Jongin cry. Nobody could argue that, knowing how Jongdae had a knack for extremely tragic movies.

“Yah, Kyungsoo. I’m hungry.” Baekhyun called from the floor. “Feed us.”

“I’m not cooking,” he replied from his spot on the couch, looking extremely comfortable in Jongin’s arms wrapped around his torso. “Order pizza.”

After a game of rock-paper-scissors, Sehun begrudgingly took the task of calling for the pizza. Everyone agreed they wanted to eat but no one actually wanted to make the call.

“Yeah… I want to order pizza…”he said on the phone, as if it was _not_ obvious why he was calling the pizza place. “I want two pepperoni-sausage—”

“Two? That’s not enough for all of us, I eat one by _myself._ ” Jongin complained.

“No, sorry it’s gonna be _three_ pepperoni—”

“Wait, no,” Baekhyun interrupted him again “I want the hawaiian one.”

“I-I mean _fou_ —"

“Four pizzas? Are you sure we’re gonna finish four?” Kyungsoo looked at each of them with a pointed glare after fixing his glasses further up his nose. “I don’t want to have to deal with leftovers.”

“Then how many? Three hawaiian?” Sehun asked annoyed, phone still pressed to his cheek. “No, not you—I’m asking my fr- we’re not sure.... could you please wait?”

“I don’t want pineapple in my pizza, that’s fucking gross.” Jongdae spat.

 _“I don’t want pineapple in my pizza, that’s fucking gross.”_ Baekhyun mocks him, imitating his friend with a stupid voice and crossed eyes. “Then don’t eat it.”

“Hey, ask for the garlic sauce.”

“Hello? Yeah, can we get some garlic sauce—No, I still don’t know… do you have bread sticks?”

“We’re not going to order just one whole pineapple pizza for Baekhyun.”

“I like hawaiian pizza too.” Chanyeol declared.

Jongdae gave him a look. “ _Of course_ you fucking do.”

“Wait,” Sehun said again. “So two pepperoni and two hawaiian?—No, not you! I’m still asking… yah, you don’t have to be mean…. I have feelings, you know… That’s some horrible customer service from your part...”

“Ask to speak to the manager.” Jongin laughed at Sehun’s appalled look.

“Just order the goddamn pizza.” Kyungsoo pinched the bridge of his nose when he heard Sehun fighting on the phone with an offended whine.

After he finally ordered two pepperoni-sausages, one hawaiian and a pack of bread sticks, Sehun turned to Kyungsoo and stretched the hand with the phone in it saying “Hyung, I don’t know your address.”

Half an hour later, they were sprawled around Kyungsoo’s coffee table, _finally_ eating the pizza after carefully examining it and making sure it was free of dubious revenge damage after Sehun’s quarrel with the girl on the phone. In the end, Baekhyun had gotten his pineapple pizza and shared it with Chanyeol, the only other person with a refined taste, apparently, while the other four had their own two boxes, one for each couple.

“So, _Dumb and Dumber,_ ” Jongdae said, mouth full of cheesy bread. “Since everyone already has a date for Prom, why don’t you two go together?”

Baekhyun, missing the glowering look Chanyeol was giving his friend, asked him “What do you mean everyone already has a date? I thought we were all going together as a group.”

“Well, Yixing and Wendy are obviously going together and now those two,” he motions with his elbow—hands too busy holding a cheesy slice of pizza— to Kyungsoo and Jongin, who were uninterested in the conversation, too entertained by feeding each other and giggling like _idiots._

“I don’t remember _you_ having a date.” Chanyeol sneered in.

“Actually, _idiota,_ I do. I’m going with Suzy.” Jongdae retorted.

“You’re dating Suzy now?!”

“Nah.” he took another bite of his pizza. “Suzy is not allowed to date and she says she’s too focused on getting into college, anyway. But we do make out in a secret nook in the library every now and then.”

“ _What?”_ Kyungsoo suddenly snapped his attention to the conversation.

“Oh, don’t play dumb, Mr. Student Body President. I know you and Jongin go there too. I’ve _heard_ you.” 

“I thought we were all going together.” Baekhyun muttered with a pout. Suddenly, he wasn’t feeling hungry anymore.

“Sehun doesn’t have a date either!” Chanyeol offered. “We’ll be us three.”

“Not that the idea of being a third-wheel to you two at Prom isn't _extremely_ appealing,” Sehun said sarcastically. “but, I’ll be too busy and I don’t need a date. I’m DJ-ing.”

“Says who?” Kyungsoo rebuked.

“Me. But let’s not worry about that now. We still have plenty of time to show how I’m the best, _free_ option you have.”

“Sehun, I’m not hiring you to be the DJ at Prom.”

“You’re not hiring me, I’m volunteering.”

Before the discussion could go any further, Jongin demanded they watched the next movie : Fantastic Beast and Where to Find Them. They all gathered the empty boxes of pizza and rearranged their positions since there were many complaints about the previous ones. This time, Jongin and Kyungsoo still had a couch to themselves but the latter had brought a bean bag from his room which Jongdae gladly took. Sehun lay diagonally on the floor and Chanyeol and Baekhyun were left on the couch by themselves. 

Somewhere around Newt Scamander making a mating dance with a rhino-looking thing, they shifted, and Baekhyun found himself lying on the couch, head propped on the armrest and Chanyeol behind him, one hand supporting his own head and the other on Baekhyun’s hip. 

He felt Chanyeol drawing circles on his hip bone and it gave him a slight comfort he silently needed at that moment. He let the welcomed touch lull him into his thoughts. Part of him was a bit disappointed that they were all going separately to the Prom. Sure, they would all be together in the end, he knew, but it wasn’t the same if everyone was having their own separated moments with their dates taking up all their attention. 

He kind of had already figured that Yixing and Wendy were going together. Yixing even ditched them today, seeing as they were having a date on their own at the girl’s house. Baekhyun was surprised that he did not care as much anymore. What had once pained his heart so much had dissipated into just a slight hint of jealousy that left him wondering _‘but jealous of what?’_. Once, he would’ve said _Yixing, of course,_ without hesitation but these days, when he saw the couple together, it didn’t make him feel sour anymore. Instead, he watched as Yixing stared at Wendy _so in love_ and _so happy_ and as she returned the gaze in the same way and he felt… happy? He felt happy for Yixing. He watched the way his friend’s face light up like the sun everytime she was near and how he looked at her like she was _everything_ when she did as much as _smile_ at him _._ And when once before Baekhyun wished to be _her,_ nowadays, he had this nagging thought that he didn’t want to be her, but rather wanted what she had. What he thought he would have but as of now, didn’t.

He discretely shifted his gaze across the living room, to the other couch, where he found that Kyungsoo and Jongin were also not really into the movie—despite the younger having picked it—and were completely focused on each other instead. Kyungsoo was laying on his back with Jongin on top of him, his face in his boyfriend’s neck, giving him the softest heart-eyes, speaking quietly to each other. He watched Kyungsoo caress Jongin’s hair and the younger hug him tightly, giving a slight squeeze that made the other giggle.

And Baekhyun frowned. He frowned because he felt that same dreadful sensation in his stomach he usually got while watching Wendy and Yixing. Except, this time, he was watching Kyungsoo and Jongin and he sure as hell wasn’t in love with neither of them. 

Then a sudden realization came upon him. That he wanted _that._ He wanted what Wendy had. He wanted what Kyungsoo had. He wanted what this chick in pink in the movie had when the chubby man looked at her. 

But who would ever look at him like that?

“Hey, you okay?” he heard Chanyeol’s deep voice ask in his ear, concern evident in his voice. “You look thoughtful and you’ve gone all stiff.”

Baekhyun didn’t want to tell him. He couldn’t, it felt silly. So, instead, he just said “I’m just cold.”

Chanyeol huffed a small laugh, like he wasn’t surprised that Baekhyun would say that. The hand that was on his hip moved across his belly and he pushed Baekhyun flush against him, like a tight hug, and moved so his head was resting closer to his, his hot breath against the nape of his neck.

He immediately felt much warmer and smiled, knowing that even if Chanyeol didn’t know the real reason for his discomfort, he would always find a way to make it better.

They stayed like that for the rest of the movie and the better part of the second one, although by the point where Grindelwald had his shit show, everyone was dozing off, alcohol finally kicking in on the young boys. Baekhyun actually fell asleep for a couple of minutes and when he opened his eyes again, Kyungsoo was already turning the T.V off and putting the trash away in the kitchen. Baekhyun thought he should offer to help but he was way too comfortable where he was and there wasn’t much to clean anyway.

“Jongin and I are going to sleep in my parents room. I’ll get some blankets for whoever stays in the living room.” Kyungsoo announced, walking away with a very sleepy Jongin tailing behind.

“Dibs on Kyungsoo’s bed.” Jongdae said, before sprinting off.

“Hey, no, don’t leave me with them!” was the last thing they heard Sehun say before going after the shorter one, turning off the lights in the living room on his way.

Baekhyun _did_ feel offended but he was too lazy to comment and Sehun was already away. He shuffled a bit, slightly shaking Chanyeol, who had been asleep almost since the middle of the movie, by the shoulder.

“Yeol, wake up.” Baekhyun whispered. Chanyeol blinked slowly, a little bit disoriented, and smacked his lips a couple times.

“I was not sleeping, I was resting.” he murmured back.

“Same thing. Whatever. Switch with me.” Baekhyun commanded, already trying to climb over him.

“Why?” the other whined.

“Because the last time we slept on a couch I woke up with half my ass hanging out. So switch with me, you move too much.” he answered, finally managing to change their positions so he was securely placed between the back of the sofa and Chanyeol’s warm body.

The other didn’t complain, instead keeping Baekhyun closer, turning so they were facing each other and resuming his position with his arm holding onto his waist. Kyungsoo came not long after, throwing a thick blanket and a pillow over them saying _‘so you don’t freeze to death’_ to which Baekhyun murmured a quick _‘thanks, Kyungsoo’_. He placed the pillow under their heads, sharing it, and arranged the blanket so it was covering them from the shoulders down. The points of Chanyeol’s toes were peeking out from the blanket but there was not much he could do about it. It was his fault for being so tall. In this new arrangement, they were so close that Baekhyun could almost count every eyelash on his closed lids, had it not been too dark. Chanyeol looked so peaceful, with his eyes closed and his pretty pouty lips slightly open. 

The sight made him smile a little, the corners of his mouth turning up into a small grin. Baekhyun brought a hand up to caress the side of his face, feeling the peachy soft texture of his cheek on his fingertips.

He thought the other was already asleep, when he suddenly heard his voice speaking, making him freeze in place. “So, Baek… about what Jongdae said…”

“About what?” he asked, scooting closer with the excuse that Chanyeol’s voice was too quiet he couldn’t hear very well, despite being in complete silence in the deserted living room. 

“About going together....Since, you know, everyone does have a date but us,” Chanyeol opened his eyes, looking up at him and Baekhyun could not see but he knew him well enough to know he was probably blushing. “Are you okay with that? Would you like to?”

“As friends?” he asked, almost instinctively, though a part of him already knew the answer. 

“Y-yes, of course. As f-friends.”

“Yeah… that would be cool.” 

He saw Chanyeol smile, a small dimple appearing on the side of his face. He looked at Baekhyun so lovingly… with that soft gaze that was reserved for him and for him only, and it made Baekhyun feel warm and fuzzy inside. Chanyeol brought his hand up too and started stroking Baekhyun’s cheekbone with his thumb, until the movement started slowing down and then stopped, indicating that he had fallen asleep again, his hand still on Baekhyun’s cheek.

Baekhyun put his hand over Chanyeol’s, resting it there. As sleep was taking over him, his mind drifted to the thoughts he was having earlier. And there, with the faint sound of his best friend’s breath as his lullaby, he wondered if he would ever feel as safe with anyone as he felt sleeping next to Chanyeol or if someone would ever make him feel so lightheaded with a simple soft gaze like his.

He doubted it. But just as he was finally caving in to Morpheus's magic, he drifted into his dreams with one last thought. 

_I wouldn’t want it from anyone else, anyway._

  
  


The first thing he noticed the next morning was a ball of Chanyeol’s fluffing black hair tickling his nose, but instead of moving away, he pressed closer, inhaling his familiar scent and hugging his back tighter to the front of his body, enjoying the warmth it provided. 

The second thing he noticed were the hushed voices over him.

“This is kinda cute but also I’m cringing.”

“This feels like that time I walked on my parents having sex.”

“You saw your parents having sex?”

“No, but I _heard_ them and there’s not a day that it doesn’t haunts me.”

“Kyungsoo, you sick fuck.”

“Guys, shut up, Baekhyun is stirring up.”

“Quick, Jongin, take a picture.”

Then the third thing he noticed was a flash of light on his face, pulling him away from his plan of sleeping a couple of minutes more. He opened one eye to see his friends watching over them, Sehun with his video camera and Jongin with his phone in his hand, caught in the act.

“Jongin, you idiot. Why is your flash even on?!”

“Annoying shitheads,” Baekhyun murmured groggily, voice hoarse from sleep. He tried to sit up but when he moved, Chanyeol whined sleepily, turning around and pushing his head onto Baekhyun's chest, holding him way more tighter than someone who just woke up would.

“Whatever,” Sehun retorted. “I now have proof that Chanyeol is the little spoon.”

\--

_Could you understand how I feel as I stay in place_

_Imaging you all day as I wait_

_\--_

“I hate that you’re a morning person,” was the first thing Chanyeol told him when he picked him up at his house that morning. His face was still a bit puffy and he looked so sleepy that Baekhyun always wondered if it was safe to ride in a car with him at this hour. However, it was that or taking the bus, and he _hated_ the bus. Besides, the bus driver didn’t bring him coffee everyday.

“Years of track practice made me a morning person.” Baekhyun answered, taking the coffee Chanyeol was extending to him. “Ah,” he remembered. “I got something for you.”

Chanyeol looked at him with perching curiosity as he reached into his backpack and pulled a paper bag. 

“My mom made cinnamon buns last night. They are for her Book Club but I sneaked in before she put them away.” he the bag to the taller one who took it happily, instantly taking a bite and groaning with happiness. “Just don’t tell the others, I only brought one.”

“Tell them about what?” Chanyeol said, mouth full, more than a half of the cinnamon bun already eaten. 

“Jesus, Yeol. Did you even _taste_ it?”

“I can’t help it, your mom makes the best buns!”

“Yeah, my ass is living proof.”

Chanyeol choked on the last bite of the cinnamon bun. 

\--

_What do I do with all this love that's running through my veins for you?_

_\--_

“Hyung, listen to me,” Sehun says in the next Committee meeting. “ _Evil Clones_ is a great theme for Prom.”

“That doesn’t make any sense, Sehun.” Kyungsoo tells him, looking like he’s close to throwing the younger boy out the window.

“How would we even know they’re clones?” Baekhyun asks.

“Please don’t indulge him.”

“Listen,” Sehun says, holding his hands up. “Everything is the same _but_ everyone wears colored lenses. In. One. Eye.”

Kyungsoo lets his head fall on the table. Jisoo, besides him, shakes her head at Sehun, trying to stop him from talking.

“Okay, okay…. What about Tropical 80’s Drug Dealers?”

\--

The party was loud, definitely one of the most packed they’ve been to so far. It had a surprising amount of college students too, despite Minseok and Junmyeon telling them that they couldn’t attend due to the increasing works and final projects as the end of their first year of college approached. Baekhyun suspected, then, that the people who were here would be most likely older. 

They’re not sure whose house this is—if it can be considered a house as it looks more like a warehouse slash home hybrid. It is pretty far from their usual neighbourhoods and the outside of the place definitely looks like the scenery of the start of a horror movie. Metal sheet structure, covered in a mess of graffiti, in the middle of some deserted lot. It looks like it has been divided in two. The downstairs floor is where the chaos of the party roars through and the upstairs looks like the home part. Jongdae only told them that Taehyung invited him, who was invited by Wonho, who was invited by a friend from another school. 

“Are we getting killed?” Kyungsoo asks as Jongdae found a space to park, Chanyeol with the rest of the gang taking the slot next to him.

“No, we’re getting _smashed,_ ” he answers and Baekhyun wants to retort that it doesn’t sound great if you put it in context, but decides to shut his mouth and exit the car as they enter the place.

There are a good number of people they can recognize from their school, but there are also about a hundred of complete strangers dancing around. Whoever planned this party must be really popular. 

Baekhyun doesn't consider himself to be an introvert, not at all. But he can’t deny that he likes to meet the people he's rolling with, before he lets loose. He’s had many horrible experiences in the past due to coming on too strong on other people, and he’s never been in a place like this before. That being said, he’s happy that he has friends that are less bashful than him and laughs hard as Jongdae makes his way to one of the many kegs in the place.

“SHOTS! SHOTS! SHOTS!” The crowd chants and somehow a shot is being placed in his hand. He looks back to see Kyungsoo and Sehun with newfound glasses in their hands as well, Jongin putting his aside as he is the second designated driver of the night. 

They all shrug their shoulders, before drowning the shots in unison. 

The place is dark, save for some lilac UV light that makes their teeth look creepily white. Half of the space is taken by loud teenagers going crazy around the kegs and playing drinking games and the other part has been turned into a makeshift dance floor, where people are more dry humping than anything else. There’s even a bar counter on the side and Baekhyun could only wonder _what the hell is this place?._

About forty minutes later, the group disbands through different parts of the house. He’s had a couple of drinks on him, not enough to be drunk, but enough to feel warm and buzzed. He’s trying to find one of his friends. He’s almost certain he can hear Jongdae’s screeches if he focuses enough, but on the way he finds himself being pushed into the mass of sweaty, dancing people that are gathered there.

He shimmies his way through them, trying to make it to where the air is not so thick and it doesn’t smell like tequila. He bats away at someone's hands that try to settle on his hips and stumbles forward into the crowd.

There's finally a space, where a table of snacks is meant to be, but has now been emptied and the table lays on his side on the floor, serving as divergence among the people. He smiles when he looks forward and sees the familiar face of his smiling best friend, but it drops just as quickly as it came when he takes in the scene before his eyes.

There he is, Chanyeol, in all his giant glory. There’s sweat on his forehead and a big smile on his lips as he throws his head back, looking incredibly attractive. Then, following down his body Baekhyun sees his hands on someone’s hips. That someone being no other than Kang Seulgi herself, who looked like a predator seizing on her prey, sexy, confident smirk on her beautiful face and rolling her hips to the rhythm of whatever awful song is playing, her ass pressed to Chanyeol’s front. 

Baekhyun feels appalled. His throat is dry and his stomach feels like he just received a sucker punch. He thinks, for just a second, of that moment where Yixing introduced them to Wendy and Baekhyun felt his world crumble at his feet and realizes that this particular moment right now makes that memory feel like a joke. He freezes on his spot. He sees Seulgi leaning back, throwing an arm up to tangle in Chanyeol’s hair and Baekhyun wants to scream. He wants to scream so loud that the music stops so he could throw the stupid table in front of him across the room, walk over to the dancing couple and drag Chanyeol by the hand out of this place and out of Seulgi’s lustful gaze. But he doesn’t. And he doesn’t understand why he feels so incredibly bothered when he knows he shouldn’t. Who cares if Chanyeol is dirty dancing with someone. Good for him. Great. Fantastic. Awesome.

Feeling like suddenly there’s no breathable air in this place, Baekhyun makes his way to the nearest exit that leads him to a courtyard. Several plastic tables and chairs are scattered around, but he keeps walking aimlessly, trying to contain himself and excuse his anger on being drunk, despite being aware that he only had a couple of shots and maybe half a beer that he lost somewhere.

“Hey,” he hears behind him and turns around to find Sehun, sitting on the roots of a tree, beer in hand. “You look like you just saw a ghost.”

“I think it was something worse,” he mutters to himself. “Why are you here?”

The other shrugs, taking a sip of his beer and patting the spot next to him for Baekhyun to sit. “I hate this place.”

“It’s crazy,” he agrees. “Where even are we?”

Sehun shrugs again. Baekhyun took a moment to look at him. His gaze focused forward while he took uninterested sips of the beer. Sehun wasn’t one for intense facial expressions, but he looked kinda gloomy. His usual eccentric self had been toned down and he felt a little bit worried for his young friend. 

Baekhyun follows his line of vision to look across the courtyard, where Sehun had his gaze set. It was Yukhei. The boy from his AV Club who had confessed to him on Valentine’s Day. He was sitting in the trunk of a car, drinking with his friends. He too looked sorrowful, throwing discreet glances at Sehun. Thinking back on it, Baekhyun hadn’t seen them together a lot lately. For most of the school year Yukhei had been trailing behind Sehun like a loyal puppy, his own camera in hand ready for whatever Sehun pointed at. 

“Sehun,” he started quietly, remembering how his friend was quick to walk away on Valentine’s. “What happened with you and Yukhei?”

  
“Nothing”

“Were you two… dating?”

Sehun shoots him an annoyed look. “No. We were _not_ dating.”

“He’s cute. He obviously likes you, if that’s why yo—”

“Well, I don’t like him. Okay? Just… drop it,” he snaps, throwing his empty bottle to the side. Then he looks down to his legs, muttering, “this is not how it was supposed to be.”

“Sehun…” Baekhyun tries again, but he didn’t know what to say. He doesn’t understand what’s going on, but his friend looked so… _broken._ And he hated the sight, he hated that he didn’t know how to help. He watches as tears begin to pool in his small eyes, but his friend was not letting them spill.

He places a careful hand on his shoulder. “Are you okay?”

“It’s just that…” he started, his voice a little shaky. “This isn’t how it was supposed to go. He was supposed to be my _friend_ . I thought he was going to be my friend and we would have fun. You’re all going to graduate this year, but we were going to be together next year and be _friends_ and do crazy shit in the AV club b-but... but he had to fuck it up!”

“Sehun wha…” he trailed off when a thought suddenly hit him. This wasn’t some lovers’ quarrel. This wasn’t about some unrequited love. And everything made so much sense now, that Baekhyun felt so guilty about not noticing sooner. The sudden interest in the Committee, the ‘experiences’ he talked so much about, why he was acting so _extra_ this school year, the camera, the parties. This was about Sehun being _afraid._ Afraid of being left behind and alone when they all graduated this summer and he had to wait another year in school.

Baekhyun felt so stupid.

“Sehun… you know that even when we graduate, we’re still going to be friends, right? It’s not like we would forget you or… or…”

“Yeah, but you see how it is? Like with Minseok-hyung and Junmyeon-hyung? You’re all going to move on and be at college and have your own lives away and I’ll be just… here.”

“B-but we would still see each other. We can face time a-and you can visit us on campus…” he offered. “And just because Yukhei likes you doesn’t mean you can’t be friends.”

“What, like you and Yixing?” _Okay, that hurt._ “Or Chanyeol and…”

“Chanyeol and who?” he asks a bit too quickly.

 _Chanyeol and Seulgi? Does Chanyeol like her?_ Has he been so blind all this time to not notice that? It wouldn’t surprise him, seeing as he couldn’t see how restless Sehun had been about them graduating, when he had been practically screaming in their faces.

“Nevermind.” Sehun finished. “I don’t want a friend that’s in love with me and I can’t love back... I don’t want to do that to him... I see how it is with you and Yixing, hyung. When Wendy is near you look so dreadful. The longing gazes and shit. I don’t want to do that to him.”

“I-I don’t…” Baekhyun tried to deny it but… what was the point? It’s not like it isn’t true. 

He sighs, defeated.

“And have you told him that?”

Sehun shakes his head.

“Well, maybe… you should?” The other turned to look at him, his gaze clearly told him how stupid that idea sounded to him, but Baekhyun continued. “Part of why I was so hurt when Wendy came along was because… because I didn’t even get a _chance._ I didn’t get to tell Yixing how I felt. And if he rejected me it would be _fine_ , because at least I could cut that fantasy and _move on_ . Would it hurt, yes, probably, but we’d get over it and still be friends. Have closure or whatever.” He looked down at his own hands, his voice a little bit softer. “And what Yukhei did was… that kind of thing takes a lot of courage, you know? First of all to admit it. Even to yourself. And then to the other person, because… because when you already have this connection with someone and _then_ there’s feelings, it is… scary. Like you could lose everything if you speak up? A-and you’re not sure if it’s better to risk it all or just continue with what you already have...even if it’s not enough, but at least is something…”

“Are we still talking about Yixing?”

“Y-yes, of course.”

Sehun took a deep breath. Baekhyun could almost see the nuts and bolts turning around in his head as he processed what he had just dumped on him. Even Baekhyun was thinking about it and trying to put the nagging sensation on his chest aside. _This is not about… Not now._ He squeezed Sehun’s shoulder encouragingly.

He breathes out. “I guess you’re right”.

“I’m always right.”

Sehun snarls.

“Fuck you.”

“Okay, okay. I… I guess I’ll go talk to him.” Baekhyun patted him encouragely on the back.

He watched as Sehun approached the group Yukhei was in. There was a clear tension towards him. Yukhei’s eyes were wide and his eyebrows rose up as Sehun approached him. One of the guys, one with a lot of ear piercings, was even giving him the dirty eye as he stepped closer to the freshmen boy. But then, Yukhei nodded slowly at whatever Sehun said and then the two of them were walking away together, clearly hoping to find somewhere more private.

Baekhyun smiled to himself and wished for things to go well for his friend. He felt a little bit sorry for the younger one, but, as he told Sehun, it was for the best to be honest.

He checked his phone. He had two messages. One from Chanyeol and one from Kyungsoo, both of them asking him where he was. He felt the uncomfortable anger from before setting in his stomach and replied only to Kyungsoo, despite Chanyeol’s text being the most recent.

He responded almost immediately, telling him that the rest of them were upstairs. He figured that Sehun and Yukhei would be talking for a while, so he replied that he was coming over to them.

Climbing up the stairs, Baekhyun noticed that the party there was a whole different ambiance. Still packed but not as loud, the music was different and the lighting was _normal._ He was not wrong when he figured that the upstairs part would be the home; it looked like some kind of industrial studio apartment and it was easier to locate the rest of his friends once he walked further. 

They were sitting on the floor. Kyungsoo, Jongin, and Jongdae laughing together as they watched a clearly _drunk_ Wendy passed out in Yixing’s legs, who didn’t look any more sober himself.

“What’s up with them?”

“I challenged them to see who could down a bottle of beer first,” Jongdae said with an amused smirk.

“Oh. Did she lose?”

“No” he answered, setting off a fit of sniggers between the boys again. Yixing looked embarrassed. “She won. _Three times._ ”

Baekhyun sat next to them. He thought of explaining the situation with Sehun, but he figured that it was probably not the best time right now, in the middle of a party and with Yixing’s girlfriend drunkenly mumbling ‘ _loser_ ’ in English to her boyfriend, making the rest of them laugh. There’d be another time.

Somehow, their circle started expanding, an open invitation for random strangers to sit with them and then, unexpectedly—well, not really, as it was Jongdae who _demanded_ it—it turned into a game mixture of ‘spin the bottle’ and ‘truth or dare’.

It developed quickly, as any drunken game with a lot of random teenagers would. Jongin gave Kyungsoo a lap dance that left the owl-eyed boy with a fiercely red face, and Baekhyun ended up kissing a girl that he didn’t recognize from school, who was _way_ more into it than he was. He had to push her away when she awkwardly tried to slip her tongue into his mouth. He heard some ‘boo’s from the crowd and he tried not to grimace too obviously as he cleaned the saliva from his chin. 

“Chanyeol is wondering where we are,” Jongin announced, looking at his phone. “I’ll tell him we’re up here, he’s probably lost downstairs.”

“He seemed pretty fine,” Baekhyun snarled. If the others noticed the venom in his voice, they didn’t say anything.

Not much longer, Yixing perked up, waving to a stray giant that was looking for them. He grinned widely when he spotted them and squeezed himself between Baekhyun and Jongin.

“Hey you, I looked for you everywhere,” he said happily.

“Hey.” Baekhyun retorted shortly, looking to the other side, holding back a sarcastic snarl about _surely not being on Seulgi’s ass_ and told himself that it shouldn’t bother him.

Still he continued to ignore Chanyeol for the next couple rounds of the game. Baekhyun could feel his eyes on him, unmoving, perusing nervously, but he refused to look back. 

It was Jongdae’s turn to spin the bottle and Baekhyun should’ve seen it coming, really, but he was too busy being angry, when the bottle landed on Chanyeol and the shorter one grinned wickedly at them.

“Chanyeol,” he tittered, making the other turn his gaze from Baekhyun, confused as to why he was being called when he finally noticed the bottle. “Truth or dare?”

He felt Chanyeol still beside him, pausing a couple of seconds before he stuttered “D-dare.”

 _Wrong move,_ Baekhyun thought, as Jongdae’s cheshire-cat smirk grew bigger and then he spoke, dragging his words with devilish delight. “I dare you to _7_ minutes of heaven _...”_ really, he should’ve seen it coming. “ _with Baekhyun._ ” 

He heard Chanyeol gulp. Kyungsoo’s eyebrows rose up and Jongin sniggered behind him—even Yixing was discreetly shaking Wendy awake so she could too be amused at the shit show that was about to unfold. 

_Why?_ Baekhyun thought nervously, as his gaze shifted to each of his friends. Why did it matter? _Why was he even nervous? It’s just Chanyeol, for fuck’s sake._ He felt a hand grabbing him by the forearm, and before he could realize, he was being shoved into a closet pantry with Chanyeol in tow. 

The pantry was tight. Pitch black dark save for the thin line of light on the floor that wasn’t even wide enough to illuminate both of their shoes. He could feel Chanyeol’s presence in front of him, just a few centimeters separating them.

None of them spoke for what felt an agonizingly long period of time. He couldn’t explain why he felt so awkward with Chanyeol, of all people. Was it because of what he saw earlier? Was it because he could feel Chanyeol’s hot breath on his forehead or was it because he could smell his cologne—with a slight combination of sweat— and the manly scent was giving him images that he _most definitely should not have._

He swallowed and after what felt like an eternity later the words tumbled out of his mouth.

“Are you mad at m—”

“I saw you with Seulgi.”

He mentally slapped himself in the face at how stupid he sounded. Chanyeol stilled for a second, probably confused at why Baekhyun was bringing up _that._ Like it was any of his concern. 

“Uhm…”

“Where is she? I thought she might like to play this. It seems like something she’d like,” he asked again trying, and failing, to sound casual.

“Uh.. I don’t know? I think she went to drink with her friends.” 

“Hm.”

Then there was silence again. 

“So are you two going together to the Prom?”

_“What?”_

“You and Seulgi.”

“Wh- _No._ I thought _we_ were going together.” He sounded genuinely confused and Baekhyun _really_ wanted to slap himself in the face. He didn’t know if it was because he lost his mind or the complete darkness was giving him some kind of dumb confidence, but he kept talking.

“I-I just—I saw you two dancing and I thought… I think that you should go to the Prom with whoever _you_ want to go. I don’t want you to be stuck with me just because I don’t have a d—”

“I want to go with you.”

“...Oh.” 

He let himself smile, knowing that the other couldn’t see him. “Okay.”

“ _Okay.”_

Then, he felt Chanyeol shift closer. So close that their chests were touching. He felt Chanyeol’s fingers touch his chin, lifting his head up ever so slowly. His heart started beating so fast that he thought there was no way that the other couldn’t hear. But he was almost certain that he could hear Chanyeol’s fast beating as well.

“Baek…” he whispered. His lips were so close to Baekhyun’s that he could feel them lightly graze his own as the other spoke quietly. He felt like he couldn’t breathe. “I... I think the first time was not… Well, I didn’t even ask. Did I?”

Baekhyun could not even answer. He couldn’t move at all. The light feeling of Chanyeol’s mouth so near his own was keeping him there in a hypnotizing feeling. He was panicking, but he fought to appear calm. The taller’s voice was surrounding him slowly like vines around his body, keeping him in place. “Would you be my date to Prom?”

 _“Yes,”_ he breathes out. 

Even if he couldn’t see, he _knew_ Chanyeol was smiling. He could almost feel it against his own. No one said anything for a couple of seconds, so quiet that he almost forgot that there was still a party outside until he heard Jongdae’s voice from the other side of the doors, breaking him away from his trance.

_“Are you guys getting it on yet? ‘Cause your time is about to end.”_

Then, the next series of scenes happened so quickly, that Baekhyun wondered if it really happened or his dazed mind made it all up on the spot. 

He felt the _faintest_ press of plump lips against the corner of his mouth. It was done as quickly as it was there. It almost felt like the first drop of water falling on your face when it’s about to start raining. So faint and so fast that you’re not really sure if it’s real. 

Then Jongdae’s loud screech as he opened the pantry door and Chanyeol was sliding out so fast that Baekhyun barely had time to breakaway from his trance and trail after him, following through the labyrinth of people. In his sprint, Chanyeol bumped into a guy, who knocked over the cup he was holding in his hand, spilling its content on his chest.

“Hey, watch it faggot.”

“Sorr—”

“What the fuck did you just call him?” Baekhyun growled. A new, _different,_ wave of anger filled his whole body all in once. Like someone set him on fire from the inside. 

Then the guy was turning around. An ugly snarl on his even uglier face as he spoke, “The fuck you want, you fucking fairy?”

“What the fuck did you just called _me?”_

“I _said_ you’re a fucking fag—”

And then, nobody saw it coming. Nobody would have expected it, really. Baekhyun was at least a head shorter than the guy and most people tend to underestimate him when it comes to his strength, due to his scrawny physique and soft face. But there, trying to recall his ten years of hapkido in just a split of a second, he launched his fist in a hook, landing straight on the guy’s nose.

The crowd around them froze. Chanyeol looked at him with wide eyes, equal parts confused and astonished that Baekhyun just _did_ that. But then the guy was turning around again; he observed his fingers after touching his nose, examining the blood stain of blood and the last thing Baekhyun saw was a fist coming towards his face before everything blacked out.

\--

“I can’t believe you did that!” Chanyeol said for the nth time, mostly to himself as he drives them back home. 

Apparently, not long after Baekhyun was _knocked out_ the police arrived, ending the party right there—and even taking some of them away. Chanyeol hurried, carrying a passed out Baekhyun towards his car (and thinking back on it, Baekhyun was very thankful, because even the tiniest possibility of his father being there and discovering him there, with a black eye and not a single logical explanation… he would be majorly fucked). Jongin took the rest of the gang in Jongdae’s car, the five of them still talking about Baekhyun punching some college dude in the face as they waved them goodbye. 

“I can’t believe I did that either,” Baekhyun said with a smile way too bright for someone who was sporting a painful black eye. “Do you think it’ll still be there for graduation?” he asked, examining his face on the visor mirror.

“I don’t know. I—” he groaned. “I can’t take you home like that! Your mom’s gonna kill me!”

“Whatever. It’s not like you did it,” he said. 

He was still gloating happily and Chanyeol looked at him worried that he might have a concussion. But in his mind, Baekhyun _just_ had his first fight ever, defending his favorite person in the world _and_ he had a date to prom. Nevermind the pain on his face, he still would place this night on his top ten moments. 

“She’s totally killing me,” Chanyeol cried. “I can’t believe you did that.”

“Stop whining, I was defending your honor!” Baekhyun reprimanded. “Even though I’m a little bit annoyed that I ended up with a fucked up face and you have the cool bloodied knuckles” 

“I have bloody knuckles for punching the guy who _knocked you out,”_ Chanyeol recounted. “If any, _I_ was defending your honor. Besides, fights are _not_ cool.” 

“Yes, they are cool.”

Chanyeol was silent for a couple of seconds, his jaw tight as he drove. “Okay, they’re maybe a bit cool,” he complied.

Baekhyun barked a laugh. He kept smiling the rest of the drive. And he was still smiling even after his mom almost passed out when he saw him. Even after she scolded them angrily and looked extremely bewildered telling Baekhyun he was grounded until graduation. But the smile didn’t faltered one second. Even as he waved Chanyeol goodbye from his bedroom window and went to sleep smiling like the happiest man on earth with a purple bruise growing on his eye and the ghost of a touch on the corner of his lips.

\--

_Happy birthday beautiful angel!_

_I hope you have a day just as wonderful as mine is whenever you’re near._

_Eat something delicious and have fun!_

  
  


_\--_

Baekhyun has never been particularly fond of his birthday. Not in the way Sehun says birthdays are just another tradition to give into the darkness of capitalism and self-indulgence but still demands he has birthday messages before the first ten minutes of his birthday. (“J _ust because I’m aware that birthday ain’t worth shit, doesn’t mean I don’t participate on it and want to be worshiped for a day,”_ he’d say one day). It’s not like that.

Baekhyun doesn’t like birthdays in the way he feels completely awkward sitting in front of a cake while other people sing off-tune to him, and he’s not sure what he’s supposed to do with his hands. He doesn’t like that his mom stares at him with a sad, nostalgic smile and whispers _‘my baby is growing so fast’_ at least 30 times a day—and she does it _every_ year. And then his father pats him a little too hard on the back and says ‘Son, you’re becoming a man’ and Baekhyun wants to argue that he was born a man, but doesn’t. Then come the calls from long stranded relatives that only call to wish him a happy birthday because his mom must have threatened them in the group chat. Birthdays are just awkward, man.

He’s thinking that while walking towards their usual table during lunch. All of his friends have already wished him a happy birthday and hugged him. Even the Mystery Note’s Person left a box of strawberry Pocky and a cute note that made Baekhyun’s heart do a little tap dance. Everyone _except_ Chanyeol. Baekhyun tries to not feel so bitter about it even if he can’t believe that it seems like his best friend in the whole world has forgotten about his birthday. He was trying really hard not to be mad about it. 

But as he nears the table, he sees Kyungsoo and Chanyeol talking hushiedly. Chanyeol is hunched over the table and they’re obviously discussing something if the way Kyungsoo has his ‘scolding stare’ is anything to go by. He has this stern look as he talks to Chanyeol and Baekhyun wonders if he should go away and give them space, but he’s already a few steps away.

“Hey,” he says, feeling uncomfortable by the way Chanyeol quickly sits back and looks at him like he’s being caught red-handed. Kyungsoo’s gaze lingers on him a second longer before shifting to Baekhyun.

“B-Baekhyun!” Chanyeol says and Baekhyun wants to be petty, but he can’t when the other is looking at him with that fond smile.

“What were you talking about?” he asks casually, setting his tray on the table. Kyungsoo opens his mouth to speak, but gets interrupted.

“I-I have something to show you!” he says, and Kyungsoo only rolls his eyes and keeps eating. Baekhyun squints his eyes, finding the situation a little suspicious, but then Chanyeol takes him by the wrists and is dragging him outside the cafeteria and into the hall.

Baekhyun lets himself be dragged, despite his claim of hating when Chanyeol manhandles him like that, because he is curious and _excited_ about whatever the other one wants to show him. And Chanyeol looks excited too, hopping happily and smiling when they finally reach his locker. He opens it and pulls out an envelope. Baekhyun’s eyes widen a little when he thinks he catches a glimpse of red paper inside the locker, but then the door is closed and he _can’t really_ be sure of what he saw, since it might just have been bad lighting or literally any other thing inside his friend’s locker, who is not necessarily known for being clean or organized (and to be honest, neither is he. Minseok used to have monthly check-ups on both of their lockers the previous years, so they didn’t _drown in crap_ as he kindly liked to put it) so he just lets it slide. 

“Happy birthday Baek!” Chanyeol says, presenting the envelope to him. He can tell he is a little bit nervous, shifting on his feet but his smile is deceiving. 

He thanks him and takes the envelope with a grin. He swallows, feeling a little nervous too for some reason.

“Open it,” the other instructs.

He does as he’s been told, carefully handling the paper and his beating heart. He’s not sure what he was expecting, really, but certainly not this. He retrieves from inside the envelope another two elongated papers. His breath hitches and his heart stammers at the same time. He looks back up to Chanyeol in disbelief who is grinning so proud at him.

“Are these…”

“Yes they are.”

“No,” he says. “Impossible” is the only thing he can offer because he now has in his hands not only one but _two_ concert tickets to see Girl’s Generation— his favorite band, _ever_ — and he had tried so hard to get these tickets himself but they were completely sold out in about half an hour after the date was released. Baekhyun had been completely grumpy about it and he can’t believe he has them now in his hand. “How did you even get them?”

“I asked my dad. He pulled some strings, but it was no big deal, really.” Baekhyun wants to scoff because these are front row tickets for a concert that was sold out more than _six months_ ago and Chanyeol’s father is a lawyer, not God, so it must have been a big deal.

“Chanyeol, I love you,” he says without thinking and throws his arms around the taller’s neck in a very, very tight hug, wincing only slightly when he brushes his shoulder against the fading bruise of cheekbone. He kind of wants to punch himself in the face for feeling so petty before, thinking his best friend forgot his birthday when he knows very well that he could never. 

Chanyeol wraps his arms around his waist and squeezes just as hard and then kisses the side of his face and _oh, this feels so nice_ and his touch is so soft and Chanyeol smells so nice that Baekhyun pulls away before he starts thinking things he shouldn’t. 

He looks at the tickets in his hand again completely astonished. “I really can’t believe it. I don’t even know who am I gonna go with.”

Chanyeol stills. “Excuse me” and even if he tried he wouldn’t be able to hide the insulted look on his face. “The fuck you mean you don’t know who you’re going with?”

“What? You?” he asks, eyebrows raised.

“I can take them back, you know,” he warns.

“Chanyeol you hate SNSD.”

“I don’t hate them,” he pauses. “I just _strongly dislike_ Taeyeon. She thinks she’s hot shit.”

“Because _she is_ hot shit,” Baekhyun corrects him.

“Whatever. I like Tiffany better, she’s hot.”

“What we’re not gonna do is put two amazing queens against each other,” Baekhyun says, finishing the discussion. Then he asks, unsure, almost shy. “Do you really want to go with me?” 

“Of course I do. That’s why I bought two!... Do you want me to go with you?”

“Yes!” he answers way too quickly and flushes. “With the condition that you will dance along with me to every song.”

“I don’t know any of the dances.”

“Don’t worry,” he laces their arms together happily, redirecting them back to their lunches. “You’ve got another two weeks to learn.”

\--

_You're not mine, I'll be yours_

_I choose to belong in your arms, allow me_

\--

After a whole ass year of ups and downs and a gross amount of unwanted feelings, Baekhyun finally feels like he can take a breath. For one night he feels like he’s living that fantasy he wanted so badly and lets himself be just another teeanger that can enjoy a concert and doesn’t have to worry about college, unrequited love, track competitions, bruised eyes or being an adult. Everything else can come later.

Tonight he can yell the lyrics to his favorite songs as his favorite artists sing, laugh, eat overpriced snacks, and scream. Chanyeol even kept his promise of learning a dance, one at least, and dances to “The Boys” with him. He does a terrible job, but Baekhyun laughs and enjoys every second.

Coming out of the concert venue, Baekhyun has to stop and take a deep breath because it was _truly_ the best night of his life. There’s a faint breeze running a chill through his body. The cacophony lights of the street lamp give this ethereal glow, almost fantasy-like and he needs to take a moment to let it all in. Going out with his best friend to see his favorite band in the world _front row_ ; it just didn’t get any better than this. He feels high on life and happiness, the adrenaline of excitement still rushing through his veins.

Chanyeol turns around once he noticed that Baekhyun wasn’t following his pace. He looks at him with a curious expression. “You’re making a weird face.”

“I’m…” he can’t help the smile breaking on his face. “I’m just very happy.”

He smiles too proudly and cocky, and walks back, closer to where the other is standing on the sidewalk. “Because of _my_ gift?” he asks, wiggling his eyebrows.

Baekhyun rolls his eyes. “No. Because Taeyeon looked at me for a second during ‘Lion Heart’ and I will never forget that.”

Chanyeol's silly smile falls from his face for a second. Replaced by an annoying, childish scowl. “Whatever,” he says, but there’s still a trace of amusement in his voice. He keeps his eyes on his face, examining him and Baekhyun starts to feel hot under his stare but doesn’t look away. Tonight, he thinks, can give himself just this. “Looks very cool…” he motions to his eyes with an idle finger. “The thing Yoora did, the makeup. It suits you.”

Earlier on, when Baekhyun got to his house and Chanyeol was still in the shower, he ended up chatting with Yoora for a while. He lamented to her that he would look at his photos in the concert and see the purple bruise under his eye and cheekbone, but was happy anyway. She went to her room straight away and came back with a small bag and started doing her work on him without a single word. He’s never worn makeup before, but he didn’t complain. Yoora applied a light BB Cream to his face to hide the bruise and went even further to put an orange eyeshadow on his lids. It wasn’t his favorite color, really, but it did look quite cool. 

Chanyeol stuttered when he saw him once he came out of the bathroom, and Baekhyun thanked Yoora purposely, which she only replied with a knowing smile, saying that her work was all done and told them to have fun.

“Thanks.”

He didn’t realize that, while being lost in his thoughts, Chanyeol had gotten closer. Not surprising since it seems like they always drifted towards each other unknowingly. Baekhyun’s heart is having a drumroll inside his chest and he wonders if Chanyeol had ever noticed how his sole presence always affected him so much. It was kind of embarrassing and Baekhyun tries to conceal it as much as he can… but for some reason, tonight he wants to feel it. Just this one time. He licks his dry lips and the action doesn’t go unnoticed by Chanyeol, who glances down to his mouth.

Baekhyun shivers.

“Are you cold?” Chanyeol asks.

“Um, y-yeah.”

The taller boy moves his hands to his mouth, making a little cocoon and exhaling into it, warming them. Then he presses his palms to Baekhyun’s cold cheeks. He moves closer but Baekhyun freezes on the spot. He doesn’t even know how to breathe in that moment. He can’t hear anything but the thumping in his heart and the other’s calm breathing. Chanyeol is _so_ close and then he tilts his head upwards with his hands. Their lips are just a only couple of millimeters apart, and his mind goes back to that party, weeks ago, in the dark pantry where they were in this exact distance, but at least back then he had the darkness to provide some kind of courage. 

Chanyeol licks his lips and then takes a big breath that Baekhyun feels in his whole body. Like he sucked the air out of him like a dementor.

_Please kiss me,_ he thinks, and it both surprises and scares him how much he wants it.

Then Chanyeol leans in and Baekhyun closes his eyes, expecting to feel that ghostly kiss like he felt that other time… but it never comes. 

Instead, he feels the softest of kisses placed on his forehead. 

It feels warm and it makes his heart start beating again. He tells himself that _no, he’s not disappointed._ Why would he be, anyway? 

“Let’s go. It is cold and it’s getting late,” Chanyeol says, getting his car keys out of his pocket and starting to walk. He doesn’t wait for Baekhyun to catch up.

The ride back is completely silent. 

\--

_Is it better to speak or to die?_

Says the last note. It's a quote from one of Baekhyun’s favorite movies.

He pretends he doesn’t know what it means as he places it back into his locker.

\--

“Kyungsoo is hiding something from me.”

It was lunchtime and Baekhyun and Jongdae were hunching over the latter’s phone, looking at teaser videos of a new girl group coming up this summer. Wendy and Yixing were across them trying to take cute selfies while Sehun annoyingly photobombed them with gagging faces. They all turned to see Jongin with his announcement, looking like he was on the verge of tears.

“I think he’s cheating on me.”

Everyone at the table shared looks of uncertainty and concern. Baekhyun wanted to ask if it was a prank, if the younger had landed a very flat and unfunny joke. Although it was completely unlikely and out of character from the owl-eyed boy, Jongin's face looked so broken that it made it clear that he was completely serious. 

“What are you saying? With _who?”_ Jongdae asked him.

“I-I don’t know. He and Chanyeol—”

“ _Chanyeol?!”_ Baekhyun screamed, more than asked, voice full of disbelief. _What the hell?_

“Jongin, that’s impossible…”

“Yeah, Chanyeol is with Baek,” Yixing cut Sehun off and all the faces turned to him and then to Baekhyun like a zig-zag.

“W-what? We’re n-not together!” His face felt so red. He felt completely embarrassed, but more importantly, confused. Did Yixing really believe that he and Chanyeol were dating? For how long? Why?

Just as if he heard his name being called, the tall boy arrived at the table with a huge grin on his face that slowly dissipated as he reached them. The tension on the table felt as if it could be cut with a _hair._ Chanyeol turned to him to ask about what was going on, but for some reason, Baekhyun couldn’t look him in the eye and quickly turned away. Then he turned around, seemingly to ask somebody else, but Jongin was talking again.

“What’s up with you and Kyungsoo?” his tone was completely accusing. Chanyeol only stared at him dumbfoundedly before a flash of recognition flashed through his eyes and he turned to Jongdae.

“You told him!”

“WHAT?”

_“What?”_

“What?”

If someone turned to the table, they could clearly see the unspoken battle hanging in the air. Everyone looked so confused and so betrayed at the same time. A competition of pointed stares drawn like a pentagram between the group. Sehun seemed to make a move to retrieve his camera from his bag, but Yixing just stopped him, placing a firm hand on his elbow, not removing his gaze either as Wendy excused herself from the table and left the boys alone.

“Chanyeol…” Baekhyun started, breaking the agonizing silence, clearing his throat after pronouncing his friend’s name. He didn’t know how to start. Even if the possibility of an affair between Chanyeol and Kyungsoo was far-fetched and crazy in every way, Baekhyun reminded himself of all those moments where he thought something might happen between him and the taller and how there always seemed to be some kind of reservation on his part, like something was holding him back. Or _someone._

Still, he wasn’t sure if he wanted to know. What would it mean? What would it mean if the answer was yes or no? He didn’t know. But he had already started and all eyes were on him now, so he might as well finish his thought. “Is there… uhm, is there something between you and… Kyungsoo?” he flinched at the last word, too bizarre to even say it with a straight face.

“ _wHAT?_ No. What the f— _no._ W-what are you talking about?” he seemed completely befuddled by the idea and Baekhyun couldn’t understand why he felt… relieved.

“Then what were you accusing Jongdae of?!” Jongin asked, still wary of the giant’s words.

“About the prom thing. Jongin, what the hell!”

“What Prom thing?” Yixing asked, completely lost in the conversation, still holding the elbow of an equally confused Sehun.

Chanyeol looked like a deer caught in the headlights. But apparently he understood that Jongin didn’t know about the prank, so why he was being accused of adultery was beyond him. He swallowed hard before admitting “I was the one who put Kyungsoo up for Prom king. I-it was a stupid mistake on an even stupider plan, but Jongin, I’m not having an affair with Kyungsoo!”

The younger leaned back, processing the information. “That’s not cool, man! Kyungsoo cried.”

The accusing glares were back at Chanyeol again, who let himself fall face-forward on the table, burying his face in his hands, looking so guilty. “I know!,I-I know… I didn’t think of it at the time”

“This is such a mess.” Jongdae huffed. Baekhyun could only nod in response, still unable to look at Chanyeol—or Yixing, in the eye.

“I can’t believe you did that to ‘Soo.”

“Who did what to me?”

Chanyeol gasped loudly. Everyone suddenly held in a breath together as Kyungsoo examined them carefully, not missing a beat, he instantly noticed that something was off. Yixing now had both arms on Sehun to contain him from pulling the camera. 

Yet nobody dared to say a word, making Kyungsoo even more suspicious. 

“ _Jongin.”_ He looked at his boyfriend, who couldn’t look back, his eyes shifting everywhere and he looked physically in pain even if Kyungsoo remained with a very well practiced poker face. He was going to break in any second. Kyungsoo’s gaze shifted to the person next to him, Jongdae, and Baekhyun just braced himself at how everything was about to go _south._

“What is happening here? What is he talking about?”

Jongdae rolled his eyes, finally caving in at the chaos. “I’m sorry, this is getting too crazy.” he said this first part towards the taller, like a warning of what was inevitable. “Chanyeol was the one who put you up for Prom King.”

Kyungsoo’s gaze snapped to Chanyeol—who sank into his seat, now looking like _he_ was about to cry—, looking so incredibly angry, murderous, but then it turned to something else. He looked betrayed, hurt. 

“Did you all know?” he asked.

“Come on, Kyungsoo. It was a mistake—”

“Shut up, Baekhyun,” he turned to Jongin “Did _you_ know?”

Jongin’s gaze shot up to him “No. No, no, no. I didn’t. I-I just found out- I just asked about—” he was shaking his head furiously, looking so weak and scared. “I swear, I d-didn’t. I—I thought you were c-cheating on me…”

“Jongin what?”

“... with Chanyeol…”

“Why would you ever think that?!”

“Because y-you’ve been so secretive l-lately. A-and I heard you and him talking this morning. You said something about _being in love too_ and needing _to tell the truth._ And I just thought—I thought t-that you…”

Chanyeol’s head shot up from the table. He turned to Kyungsoo, his big eyes full of emotion. He was scared, but not the way he was a few minutes before. Kyungsoo’s jaw tightened, full of rage and fire. Chanyeol’s eyes were on him, silently pleading. 

“Kyungsoo _, please don’t…”_

Baekhyun didn’t expect for Kyungsoo to turn to him with a look on his face. He was about to hold his hands up, bracing himself for what was about to come.

“Chanyeol’s the one who’s been putting the notes on your locker.”

His heart got stuck on his throat. Like someone just pushed a tennis ball down his mouth. He turned to look at Chanyeol. Then to Yixing. He sees the Chinese boy shifting from a confused look then, as if he suddenly realized something, his mouth turned into an ‘o’. He didn’t know what that meant. He looked back at Chanyeol, who very blatantly avoided his gaze. He felt his heart beating so loud.

“Great. Any more secrets that need to be out?” Jongdae asked sarcastically. 

“Baekhyun likes Yixing.”

“Sehun _what the fuck?”_

“Let’s just get this over with, hyung. We all know anyway.” Sehun said with a serious expression. Baekhyun, again, shifted his gaze towards Yixing, who was incredibly red. He looked like he wanted to say something, but then closed his mouth. 

He turned to his other side. 

“Chanyeol I—”

But the taller just got up from his seat and left.

More awkward silence engulfed the table for a second before Jongin’s voice cut through, breaking it like shattered glass.

“I’m being held back a year.”

\--

The last two hours of school that day go by painfully and agonizingly slow. Baekhyun is lowkey thinking of stabbing himself in the neck with his pen just so he can cut this crap off. He shares the last period with Chanyeol and Kyungsoo and it just means _pure torture_ for him. Kyungsoo has been throwing murderous glances at Chanyeol, while Chanyeol keeps throwing worried puppy eyes at _him_ that Baekhyun ignores completely, focusing on his Korean History book as if it was the most interesting thing in the world, wanting desperately to pretend that the last couple hours never happened. 

As soon as the bell rings, signaling the end of the school day, Kyungsoo shuts his book with way more force than necessary and angrily strides out of the classroom so he doesn’t have to look at either of their faces. Baekhyun figures it’s probably a wise idea and tries to escape just as quickly, but the plan doesn't work as smoothly for him, Chanyeol trailing rapidly on his steps, and since his legs are much longer than Baekhyun’s, he can easily overrun him and place in front of him. 

“Baek…” he says, probably hoping that Baekhyun will stop with him, but that doesn’t happen. Instead, he just circles the taller and goes straight to his locker.

Chanyeol huffs tiredly, standing next to Baekhyun while he fumbles with his padlock and avoids his gaze.

“Can you stop staring at me? I can’t remember my locker combo,” he says when he fails to open it for the fourth time. Chanyeol reaches in and moves his hand, opening the locker with absolutely no struggle and then looks at him expectantly.

“Can we talk now?”

“What about?” he says, more than asks and he can’t really remember what he has to get out from his locker for his homework because all he can think of is Chanyeol beside him looking at him so intensely and how much he doesn’t want to have this conversation, so he just moves some books around idly.

“About the notes…”

“There’s nothing to talk about, Chanyeol. I get it. I-it was a joke. Like the thing with Kyungsoo a-and the Prom—”

“It was not a jok—”

“So we can just forget it and pretend it never happened,” he finishes definitively and hopes that Chanyeol does too.

He doesn’t.

“I don’t want to forget about it.”

Baekhyun swallows something thick stuck on his throat. Irritation grows slowly within him, and he still doesn’t want to look at Chanyeol directly in the eyes because he doesn’t know what might come out of his mouth. He just doesn’t trust himself enough.

“I’m in love with you.” Chanyeol says after a while. It sounds almost like a plea.

“No you’re not.” he answers a little bit too quickly. He tries to ignore the way his heart feels like it’s been squeezed out with the easiness someone would to a tomato, because he’s trying really hard to pretend this conversation is not happening and he just did not hear _that_ coming out of his best friend’s lips. 

It doesn’t work because Chanyeol looks like he just told him he killed his dog.

“What do you mean ‘no _I’m_ not’?” he sounds like he’s trying really hard to contain his voice from raising.

“I mean…” Baekhyun says, finally looking at him in the eye, irritation seeping from his tone. “You are not—you’re n-not… _that._ You cannot possibly mean that because you’re my best friend and that makes no sense.” he looks at Chanyeol silently asking to stop _this_. 

“Why wouldn’t it make sense, Baekhyun?” he asks a little more exasperated. “I’ve been in love with you since that first day you came in with-w-with your _pink hair_ and you sat in front of me and-and started fighting with the biology teacher about some… some... nerd thing I never got a-and then you sat with us at lunch and you became my best friend.”

“Is that why you became my friend, then?” Baekhyun asks harshly. He speaks before he can even think and immediately regrets it. “Because you liked me? And you wanted to get in my pants? Is that it?”

Chanyeol looks so hurt right there. His eyes fill with water and Baekhyun wants to cry too, but he is too _angry_ so he just continues staring at him, not knowing what to do right now. 

“No…” the taller whispers and Baekhyun wants to take it all back, but he _can’t._ “No Baek, that’s _not_ it… Why are you doing this? Why are you putting words in my mouth?”

“No. Why are _you_ doing _this?_ Why are you trying to ruin our friendship with things that don’t make sense?”

“Please don’t do this…” he pleads, and Baekhyun can’t stand him. Can’t bear to look at him like that and can’t bear to hear his voice sound so fucking broken, so he just looks away and tries to restrain himself from kicking the lockers in front of him. 

“I…” Chanyeol speaks again running a hand through his hair, but Baekhyun keeps his gaze on the floor. “I understand if you don’t feel the same… but please, just don’t dismiss my feelings like this. At least acknowledge what I just told you….”

He doesn’t. He can’t. 

He doesn’t know what exactly happens next, but Chanyeol is suddenly reaching for something in his backpack.

“Here.” He presses a stack of paper sheets to Baekhyun’s chest so hard that he stumbles backwards a little bit. “Those are the ones that never got to you.”

And then he leaves. He walks away quickly and Baekhyun just stands there watching him frozen in his place. 

\--

Baekhyun doesn’t even greet his mom when he arrives home, going straight to his room where he throws his backpack into a corner with force, never minding that all of its contents spill everywhere.

He gets to his bed and starts punching his pillow like he expects it to bleed and cry or make his knuckles hurt, but the fluffy item just swallows his fists over and over and Baekhyun just hates it so much, so he violently throws the pillow across the room. He hates the stupid pillow. He kicks the bed because he hates it too and he hates Chanyeol so much as he lets himself fall to the ground and cries.

Except that he doesn’t hate Chanyeol. Not at all. He could never hate him, no matter how hard he is trying right now.

Instead he just curls on the floor and sobs angrily because it _hurts_ so much. It hurts so much to watch Chanyeol so broken and so sad and knowing he was the cause. It hurts so much to hear Chanyeol’s words and not be able to speak back. He knows he is the only cause of all that distress that was in his friend’s eyes, and he hates himself the most for that. 

\--

It’s been a week since the big fight and most of them are still avoiding each other. They don’t sit together at lunch anymore, they don’t even look at each other in the few classes that share together. Baekhyun still talks to Jongdae every now and then because he is the one who apparently kept his word of staying ‘un-problematic’ and does not partake in the silent treatment that everyone has with each other. He spoke to Jongin once in the hallway, but as soon as he saw Kyungsoo walking down, he shot an apologetic look to Baekhyun and walked away towards his boyfriend. Apparently those two did make up and are _fine,_ even if Kyungsoo can’t look at anyone else without his jaw tightening. He misses his friends so much right now. He misses Sehun, even if he doesn’t want to be around him right now. He misses Yixing even if he can’t look him in the eye without feeling so pathetic. 

But most of all he misses Chanyeol.

He hasn’t seen the taller in a couple days. He’s been skipping the only two classes they have together and Baekhyun has been riding with his mom in the morning, so he doesn’t even get the excuse to see him around in school. And he knows he is around and that his house is just a couple blocks away from his, but he can’t go. 

He feels like they’re in two different _continents_. And he hates it so much. 

Baekhyun misses him like he would a missing limb. Like an amputated leg that just _keeps_ itching to be scratched, but there’s nothing to reach for. Like there’s something in him that isn’t whole. It feels so unnatural not being able to turn to his side to say something funny, something dumb, something nonsense, just _something_ and that Chanyeol is not there to hear it. His SAT’s were that same week and it was so discouraging to go and not be able to share his nervousness with his friends or talk about how it went after with Chanyeol. He wants to know how he did, too, even if he knows that he probably did just _perfect_. Like everything he always does. 

And Baekhyun knows that all he has to do is walk over him and _talk_ but he doesn’t know what to say. His mind comes in blank when he tries to think of how to start and it’s so weird because it’s Chanyeol? They’ve had other fights before and they’ve never lasted more than two days angry at each other—sure, none of them ever confessed romantic feelings for the other and acted like an asshole about it—but it was always just so easy to walk up to Chanyeol and say ‘sorry for being a dick’. 

But now ‘sorry’ feels like it’s just not enough. Like it’s not even _close_ to being something at all.

Sorry for what? for yelling at him? for being an asshole? for not returning his feelings?

_Does he not?_

Whatever the answer is to any of those questions, it just doesn’t feel like it’s enough of an apology either way.

\--

It’s the last Thursday before the school year ends, the second week the group has not spoken to each other, and just two days before Prom night. 

Baekhyun still walks around school like an idle version of himself and Chanyeol is still M.I.A most of the time. It’s only been to weeks, but for him it feels like it’s been two years. 

It’s an understatement to say that his heart _leaps_ out of his chest when he goes to his locker in the afternoon to get his lunch money and sees a folded piece of paper in there waiting for him. It’s not red like the usual ones; it’s plain white, but Baekhyun’s wishful heart still trembles with heavy anticipation, only to be replaced with something akin to _fear_ when he opens the folded paper and doesn’t find the printed words he expected, but a rather creepy message in various cropped symbols. Like something a serial killer would go for.

 _Don’t eat lunch at school today._ It says. Just that. 

And it doesn’t ease his nerves at all, but fearing he might be poisoned to death, he takes his money and goes to the vending machine, where he finds Jongdae there, reaching down to get a bag of chips.

“Did you leave a note in my locker?” 

“I thought that mystery has already been solved.”

He rolls his eyes and punches Jongdae on the arm. “I’m serious, bitch.”

Jongdae eyes him cautiously for a moment, before a flash of recognition shines on his eyes. “You mean a Ted Bundy-like note?”

Baekhyun nods and Jongdae raises an eyebrow.

“Did it say not to eat lunch at school today?”

He nods again, impatiently. “So it was you?”

“Not, but I got one too.”

They walk together towards the cafeteria, discussing the creepy note, lamenting that they didn’t eat lunch today as the ladies from the kitchen were planning to make a special taco Thursday as a goodbye for the graduating seniors. It hasn’t been done in a while, since the new principal wanted to keep the lunch menu strictly Korean-based, but Kyungsoo (pushed by Sehun) managed to convince the principal to have this one last effort for the students who were leaving the school. 

Chattering over other less unusual notes, they get to the entrance but freeze on their spot when they open the doors.

There are teenagers going berserk _everywhere._ The voices are loud and distressed as they walk in every direction. Others just stay seated with incredibly red hues on their faces. Baekhyun feels completely lost as what he’s seeing, when he spots the Cheerleading squad, Kang Seulgi and Park Soohyun tumbling over in laughter as they point to a couple of boys before them with the lunch trays… in front of their pants. Like they’re hiding something _inappropriate._

“Oh my god…” he whispers once he starts paying close attention.

 _Boners._ Boners everywhere. Boners on the kids with red faces sitting on the tables and refusing to stand up or even move to let others sit and hide as well. More boys running around and out of the cafeteria with the lunch trays, backpacks, books, _anything_ they could find to cover their fronts.

“Oh my god, indeed.” Jongdae says beside him, voice full of amusement.

He sees poor Lee Taeyong try to talk down the kids from his swimming team who are, too, victims of this erection craze—all _eighteen of them_ — wailing in complete panic. He has the misfortune of watching a couple of male teachers suffering from it as well, and Baekhyun feels like he’s been scarred for life at the sight. All the girls are obviously thrilled in amusement, not bothering to contain their laughter as they observe the male population freaking out. Sehun is out there with Yukhei, and Baekhyun suspects they either received a note or are part of this as both of them seem to be unaffected. They each hold onto a recorder camera, filming the chaos around them.

“Oh, no… Jongin…” Jongdae cries, but not a second later he is falling to the floor in fits of laughter.

Baekhyun follows his gaze where he finds Kyungsoo, who must have gotten a note as well. He doesn’t have a problem in his pants, but looks hectic, holding his palms out trying to calm down a freaked out Jongin who is doubled over himself, _very much_ on the verge of tears of embarrassment, his face as red as the tray he's holding to hide his manhood. 

Baekhyun doesn’t want to, really, but ends up laughing along with Jongdae.

He looks around trying to find Yixing or Chanyeol in the cafeteria. Soon he finds the former sitting next to Wendy and just as he suspected, he is unaffected as well and more worried in trying and failing to conceal his girlfriend from such a scene, but Wendy is practically choking in barks of laughter as she looks around. 

Chanyeol was nowhere to be found. 

\--

Nobody talks about what happened the day before. Either too embarrassed or too afraid to bring it up. The principal discharged them early that day, propably because he knew it was neither ethical or adequate to have a school full of students—and even some teachers— attending class with clearly visible erections under their pants.

Today the school cafeteria is locked, but nobody misses it that much as every murmur, every comment is about Prom that is just a few hours away tonight.

Baekhyun tries not to think about it, bitterly closing his locker after emptying it from all the contents he’s gathered over three years. He’s not going to the Prom tonight. He knows that his friends are going. They _all_ have dates after all. And even if he’s well aware he can attend without a date, he doesn’t want to go.

Not without _him._

He realized that it’s not as exciting if his tall giant is not coming along. He doesn’t want to wear the tuxedo they went out to pick together so they could be matching. There’s no point if he’s not going. Either as his date or just his friend. He doesn’t want to be there if Chanyeol is not with him. 

He fights the urge to cry as he detaches the photos glued to the metal walls of his locker. He has one with each of his friends, all of different days and situations he holds very dear to his heart. He feels hurtful pangs of nostalgia as he realizes that is the _last day_ of high school and he’s not speaking to any of them. All the memories placed on the pictures feel zions away. 

The last he, purposely, detaches from his locker is the one he has with Chanyeol. It’s a polaroid taken with the latter’s instant camera. Chanyeol has his usual smile on him and an arm around Baekhyun’s neck as he holds him closer while the other has his eyes closed and a boxy smile, pointing to the birthday boy. They have silly party hats on their heads because it was taken on Chanyeol’s 16th birthday, a surprise party _he_ planned for him for _weeks_ just so he could watch Chanyeol’s big dimpled grin as he turned on the lights of his garage and all of his friends jumped out screaming “happy birthday”. The camera was a gift from his sister and Chanyeol wanted to have the first picture he took with it with Baekhyun.

He puts the picture in his wallet with a sad sigh when he suddenly feels a hand tugging at his arm with urgency.

“Baekhyun-hyung, help, help!” It’s Yukhei, towering over him clumsily, alert evident in his tone. 

“W-what’s h-happening?” he manages to ask while being shaken. The younger boy is _clearly_ not aware of how much strength he possesses.

“It’s Sehun-hyung...” he says and Baekhyun raises his eyebrows as if to say _‘what about him’_ “He’s… he… he is.. choking!”

“What?!” Baekhyun barks out. “Why are you here instead of helping him?!” he asks and tries to move when he realizes that he doesn’t actually know where the younger is.

Yukhei takes him by the wrist and drags, with more force than what he probably intended—Baekhyun trips over his feet, but recovers quickly to not miss the pace the other is walking with— across the hallways to the AV room.

“He’s in there!” Yukhei says, pushing him into the classroom.

Baekhyun enters and wants to ask _why_ he is not coming with if this might be a life or death situation but once inside the classroom he does not find Sehun there, but rather _five_ other familiar faces looking at him from different spots in the room.

He turns around to ask _what the fuck_ _is going on_ but a door slams in his face.

The lights on the room turn off and the video projector turns on and there’s a figure, Sehun he presumes, with his back to the camera watching the river in front of him. After a couple of seconds he turns around, his hands on his back, looking like some kind of baby gangster.

 _“Hello friends,”_ Sehun says from the video projection on the board. _“You must be surprised. Maybe wondering why we’re all gathered here—well, why you’re gathered here. I am somewhere else watching over your sorry asses.”_

Baekhyun looks around, everyone looking as confused as he is. He turns his attention towards the screen again.

_“I am now about to show you my final project. It’s very hard work I have—_

_“_ We _have”_ Yukhei’s voice shouts from out of frame.

 _“_ We _have been planning for the whole school year. And since some recent turn of events have caused you all to act like morons, I hope that this—”_

The camera pans down to the grass. “ _Look, a tiny frog!”_

 _“Yukhei, focus!”_ he’s back on frame. _“Just watch carefully and enjoy”._

The scene changes to a black screen and then some stylish font appears in the form of a title.

MY FRIENDS

a project by Oh Sehun

and Wong Yukhei

A reel of different moments start playing on the screen; all of them. They seem to be in no particular order, and there’s audio on the videos, reduced to not overshadow the upbeat song playing as the soundtrack.

There’s a video of Kyungsoo sitting on the round table where the student council meetings take place. The camera zooms in on his face a couple of times and Sehun’s hand can be seen in the corner of the screen, making finger hearts at him and making weird sounds. Kyungsoo fights back a smile on his lips, but ends up laughing anyway. Then a clip of them in the cafeteria, Jongin has his chopsticks in his nose imitating a walrus. Baekhyun and Jongdae doing the Naruto run behind him. A clip of Jongdae on the mechanical bull at Seokjin’s party, this one is vertical and looks like it was taken with a phone. A clip of Chanyeol sleeping in the library while Sehun draws a dick on his face. Minseok and Baekhyun scream, winning a game of beer pong. Yukhei is holding an English test with an A+ , wide eyes and red face as Sehun gives him thumbs up. A clip of Yixing singing to Wendy on Valentine’s day, both looking so enamoured with each other. Baekhyun running to hug Chanyeol when he scored the winning point in the last basketball game. Kyungsoo holding tiny hand toys to his face and laughing. A clip of Jongin doing a drawing on the board; he draws a circle, two lines as eyes, a middle hair parting and an upturned ‘v’ to make the lips. Then the camera turns to a blank faced Baekhyun. Sehun and Jongin start laughing. A clip of the video when Kyungsoo confessed to Jongin. A clip of Chanyeol cuddling Baekhyun on Kyungsoo’s sofa…

He feels like he wants to cry as he keeps watching.

A clip of Wendy chugging down a beer in what looks like _ten seconds_ as Yixing watches her dumbfounded, his half empty beer in his own hand. A clip of Kyungsoo cooking, unaware of Jongdae dancing behind him, pretending to grind on him, holding his hands up. A clip of Yukhei picking his nose. Baekhyun running on the track field, way ahead of the other track runners behind him, winning the competition and collapsing on the ground. Chanyeol running to him as soon as he touches the ground. Junmyeon looking at Sehun’s new car with his mouth agape, and Sehun closes it with a single finger. Yixing making a peace sign to the camera with a smile. Sehun is sleeping on a table while Jongin writes ‘pussy’ on his face with a marker. Another clip of him with the words still on his face as a teacher reprimanded them. A clip of Chanyeol and Baekhyun laughing looking at each other… the camera turns to Kyungsoo besides them rolling his eyes. Yixing pinching Chanyeol’s butt so hard the taller jumps away while waiting in line to get their lunches. A clip of Sehun and Yukhei trying and failing to do a tik tok dance. Jongin and Kyungsoo kissing in the library, while the camera hides behind a shelf. Junmyeon and Minseok carrying Jongdae and then throwing him in a pool. Baekhyun and Chanyeol exchanging lunch items. Then they’re fighting on the floor and Kyungsoo comes in, taking them by the ear. Jongdae hugging Sehun from behind and smiling at the camera.

Baekhyun actually feels a tear running down his face as the clips keep running until the video ends. His heart feels heavy.

The screen goes black for a couple of seconds, but then there’s another clip of Sehun’s in a very _unflattering_ angle. 

“This is the end. Stop being idiots and love each other. Peace out.”

There’s a deafening silence as the video finally ends and all they do is look at each other from their respective places. No one dares to make the first move, but he can see they were touched by the video too. Jongin is crying and even Yixing eyes look glossy. Baekhyun looks at Chanyeol, his heartbeat speeds when he finds him looking at him too.

“Yo!” the door bursts open and Sehun and Yukhei come inside. “Are you all friends again?”

Quiet.

Then Chanyeol is standing up. Baekhyun’s heart is hopeful for a second, but then he sees him walking over Kyungsoo in the corner.

“I’m really sorry. I never meant to hurt you. I was stupid,” he says, honesty in every single one of his words. 

Kyungsoo smiles. “You're an idiot,” he says. There’s no venom on his voice and then they’re hugging.

Jongin joins the hug, then Jongdae and then Sehun. Baekhyun and Yixing laugh at them. And then everything feels closer to normal again.

The fight seems so insignificant now that they’re all here laughing together, that Baekhyun almost forgets for a minute _why_ they ever fought in the first place. 

Which leads him to…. Chanyeol, who is looking at him like he wants to get closer, but doesn’t know how to. Baekhyun feels like it’s _his_ duty to approach him, but suddenly there’s a hand on his shoulder.

“Hey, Baek. Can we walk?” it’s Yixing.

He wants to say _not now, first him_ , but when he turns around again Chanyeol is already out of the room.

\--

They awkwardly walk towards the parking lot in silence. Baekhyun really doesn’t want to have this conversation but figures it’s coming clean day and if there’s a perfect moment to do this…. it wouldn’t be _now_ , but he takes what he gets. Once they reach Yixing’s car, they both slump against the trunk. Baekhyun looks at his shoes like they’re the most interesting thing in the world.

“I’m really sorry...” Yixing starts, surprising Baekhyun. “If I ever hurt your feelings.”

_“What?!”_

“About what Sehun said,” he explains. “I thought about it a couple times. I knew you had a crush on me sophomore year and I thought I was cute. I just thought it faded away. I’m really sorry for not noticing it.”

Baekhyun swallows. “It’s okay. You didn’t. I guess I was just… stubborn? I liked you for _so_ long and I wanted to be your friend _but_ I also wanted you to… like me…” His face feels really hot as he speaks. “I kinda wanted you to notice it and I the same time I didn’t.”

They stay in silence for a couple minutes. Yixing is deep in thought and Baekhyun just doesn’t know what to say anymore.

“Listen, Baek. You’re one of my best friends and I love you. I _really_ do. But… I only see you like that. I’m sorry.” 

Baekhyun nods, taking it in. Accepting it. It doesn’t hurt like he always thought it would. In fact it feels somehow _relieving._ Maybe he’d been preparing to be rejected for too long. Maybe he already accepted that fate a long time ago… and maybe, he just didn’t feel the same anymore. 

“Wendy told me a couple of times.” Baekhyun freezes. A little wave of guilt rushes through him. “She wasn’t mad or anything, she just said that I should talk to you. I didn’t believe her, though. I thought it was crazy because of… you and Chanyeol.”

“We were never together,” he says and it doesn’t feel like a complete truth. It’s not a lie, he knows. But after watching the video… it feels different now. The way Chanyeol always stared at him, so loving and fond was something that always gave a warm feeling to his chest. But he wasn’t aware that he also stared back the same way. It was no secret that Chanyeol was so important to him or that he has a special part in his heart dedicated _just_ to him. But the look Baekhyun saw on _his own eyes_ in all those moments… Maybe he knew less about himself than what he thought.

“I know that _now_ , and you never actually said you were together but… I guess it made sense, you know?” 

“What made sense?” he asks, confused.

“I remember that first day you came to school. I hadn’t seen you ‘till lunch, but it felt like I already knew so much about you,” he smiles. “Chanyeol kept texting us in the group chat about this new kid with pink hair that was _so_ smart and _so_ cool. And then we saw you sitting alone at lunch and Chanyeol just kept begging me to ask you to join us and I thought…. It was weird? I’ve never seen him being shy about anything before, so I thought ‘hm, it must be really important to him’... so I went over to you and the rest is history.”

Baekhyun feels like he’s been hit by a truck. _Is that really what happened? That’s really the other side of the story he never knew?_

“And then you became friends and it was like you were the same person” Yixing continues. “You were always together, you weren’t a couple but… the way you looked at each other? I thought that was it. I thought that was why you never told me about your crush. It made so much sense when I saw you with him, Baek…. Chanyeol really loves you.”

_I love him too._

He chokes on a sob. “I fucked it up, Yixing. I was so stupid.” 

Yixing hugs him, pressing him to his side and rubbing is arm comfortably. He presses a kiss to the crown of his head. It feels so intimate, somehow. Baekhyun thinks of how, some time ago, this was all he wanted, but now he feels… nothing. There are not butterflies in his stomach or fireworks in his head. He just feels his friend, one of his best friends, comforting him and that’s all. He thinks that if this was a movie, this would have been the moment when the love interest finally realized he’s been in love with him all this time, but instead it feels so anticlimactic. 

“You know,” Yixing starts again, in a soft voice. “If what I saw was… anything to go by, then I think it’s never too late.”

Baekhyun looks up at him and smiles. “You’re so smart, you know that?”

\--

Yixing drives him home after their talk. He feels so much better after it. And a little dumb, if he’s honest. Dreading that talk for _years_ only to come back with a completely different result from it and being okay with it. If you had asked him a year ago about it, never in a million years he would’ve guessed that this is how confessing to his long time crush was going to be.

Now, laying back on his bed and looking at the ceiling, he thinks of what today’s revelation meant. About what he saw in the video. About what Yixing said. About his own feelings. He feels really frustrated but there’s something on the back of his throat wanting to come out. He said he loved Chanyeol. And he really does, that’s not news to him. But… is that it? Does he love him as his best friend only? 

He thinks about Chanyeol’s smile and how he would do anything to watch it appear on the taller’s face. He thinks of the way his heart races out of his chest every time he’s near but also the way his sole presence brings so much calm to him. How comforting it is to have him near. He thinks of their friendship and how it was almost instant the way they _both_ knew they were meant to be friends. The way they laugh together, the way they understand each other, care for each other. But…. all of these things are normal in a friendship, right? And he had been in love with Yixing for a long time. He really had feelings for him, he couldn’t deny that. And then Yixing got a girlfriend and it _hurt._ It hurt so bad… and then he got over it after a month or so. He never actually considered how easy he discharged his feelings once Wendy was in the picture. Why? What does that even mean?

But Chanyeol said he’s been in love with him from the start and that thought stirs something in Baekhyun’s belly. And it’s not anger anymore. Was it even anger in the first place? When Chanyeol said it in the hallway? It seems stupid to think so. Baekhyun had fought so hard to not hear those words, but when he did… it felt like he already knew. In fact, it felt like he wanted to hear that. What kind of person does that make him? And then the notes. How his heart squeezed in his chest and how they made him smile to _feel_ so loved and so wanted. And he spent so much time in the dark about who the person who sent them was but a part of him was… hopeful. Hopeful, maybe even _wishful_ that he already knew…

_The notes!_

He stands up from his bed, going quickly to the stash of papers he keeps on his desk and looks for the one that Chanyeol gave him that day. He hadn’t read them. It felt wrong. He felt undeserving. But now he _needed_ to know what they said.

Finding the stash of papers, he looks through them, one by one. A couple of red paper sheets with words scribbled on them, not printed or cut yet to the usual small rectangles they were when they appeared on his locker. But they were also normal, white paper sheets and even a ripped page of a notebook.

_I'll be yours all the time_

_One second, two minutes, three days, four months_

_I'll reach you, five years_

_I love you,_ ~~_but you already know that, don’t you?_ ~~

_Everytime I see you reading these notes, I want to tell you the truth_

_It feels so nice to wake up next to you_

_I wish it could be like that everyday_ ~~_for the rest of our lives_ ~~

~~_this is not a marriage proposal_ ~~

~~_unless you say yes_ ~~

_I’m dumb_

~~_I wrote a song for you_ ~~

~~_that you will never know about bc that’s totally gay_ ~~

~~_i am gay tho_ ~~

_fuck_

_You and I face each other awkwardly_

_This moment that's strange but familiar_

_Let's be together on this endless night_

_I wanted to tell you you looked beautiful tonight_

~~_but you do everyday_ ~~

_Hey, Baek it’s me!_ ~~_your best friend who is in love with you_ ~~

_hi_

_I ~~think I’ll love you forever~~ _

~~_and it scares me_ ~~

Then, the last one he read was the one that looked like a page ripped off of a notebook. One side had what he quickly recognized as biology notes messily scribbled all over. He frowned, confused. The notes were something they were seeing back in sophomore year. 

_Hey I think your hair is awesome!_

_~~You’re really smart,~~ I’d like to be your friend _

_Hi, I’m Chanyeol. Let’s be friends :)_

_You’re the coolest person I’ve ever seen_

~~_I like your hair_ ~~

~~_hi_ ~~

_My name is Chanyeol, nice to meet you_

_hello_

  
  


Baekhyun brought a hand to his mouth to hide the ugly noise that he wanted to come out. He felt like crying. Those were the notes that Chanyeol wrote _the first day_ they met. He never knew.

All the feelings came to him like an avalanche. Like a cold splash of water hitting him in the face so suddenly and if this was a movie this would be the part where he would say he was _totally clueless._

So now he had to fix it. 

_It’s never too late._ Was the last thing he thought before running towards the shower.

\--

“Mom, where are the car keys? I need to use the car!” he said, running down the stairs after he was finished getting ready.

“The car? Are you going to drive? Where are you even going?” she asked him, giving him a confused look over her glasses.

“To the Prom. Yes. I’m driving. The keys, _please._ I’m already late!” he said impatiently.

His mom watched him dumbfounded. Maybe even wondering if this was a prank. Baekhyun _never_ wanted to drive. But he looked so desperate that she had no other choice than hand him the keys with a wary hand.

“Thanks mom, I love you!” he kissed her cheek and ran towards the door.

“Be safe!”

“Yes, yes, I—” he stopped on his track and then looked back. “Do we have any flowers?”

\--

Baekhyun’s leg tapped nervously as he waited for the door to open. He swallowed a hard knot on his throat and there was sweat on his forehead even though it was actually a pretty chilly night.

The doorknob turned and Baekhyun’s eyes bulged forward.

“Baekhyunnie! What are you doing here?”

“Hi, Mrs. Park. Can I please talk to Chanyeol?”

“Um,” she looked at him unsure. “I thought he was at the Prom? Jongin and Kyungsoo came to pick him up about ten minutes ago. They said Jongdae was going to get to yo—”

“ _Fuck”_

“Baekhyun!” she said, startled, but Baekhyun was already walking back.

“I’m so sorry, Mrs. Park. I need to go! You look lovely, have a good night. Bye!”

\--

Baekhyun ran as fast as he could once he managed to _finally_ find a parking spot. He should’ve guessed that the school was going to be filled with cars, he had already lost fifteen minutes, so he needed to get there faster. 

He opened the gates of the school gym and was greeted by the loud music and the blue neon lights of the party. He knew he had to be somewhere out there, but his mind hadn’t got as far as to how he was going to find his best friend in a huge gym full of students. He walked through, looking for him. The gym was big, but it was not infinite.

“Baekhyun!” he heard someone calling for him. He turned around, it was Jongin, holding two cups of red liquid in his hands. He looked so surprised to see him. “When did you get here? Why are you holding tha—”

“Just now. I— wh— Chanyeol!” he blurted out, trying to make his friend focus on the information he needed. “Where is he?”

“I-I don’t know, he was by the tables,” Jongin said and that’s all Baekhyun needed to make his way towards the sitting area.

There were about fifty tables scattered around. The music turned louder as Baekhyun’s heartbeat turned faster. He scanned each table quickly, uncaring for the people that were giving him dirty looks when they saw him rushing by. 

Then he saw _him_.

He was sitting alone in one of the clothed round tables. He was scrolling through his phone, uncaring for the music or the people around him. Baekhyun’s breath was stolen out of him when he took a look at him. He looked so handsome with his black hair combed back and the black suit that _he_ chose for him. 

“Yah! Park Chanyeol!” 

He yelled just as the song in turn quieted down. Chanyeol looked at him surprised… and so did the other thirty students around him. Baekhyun blushed furiously.

“Can we talk outside?”

They went out through the emergency exit. It was freezing cold outside, but he didn’t care. He’d come all the way here to say something and he was not going to go back without it being said. Even if Chanyeol’s stare was burning through him like a fire in this cold weather. His throat felt suddenly so dry as he held his stare.

“So…” he started but then the words died in his mouth. His palms were sweaty and he didn’t think he’d ever been this nervous. He wanted to run, scream, combust. Anything that would take him away from this moment, but he knew that right now was no time to be a coward.

Chanyeol raised an eyebrow. 

Baekhyun cleared his throat and started again.

“I drove all the way here—

“You _drove_ here?”

 _“Yes._ Yes I drove here. And on the way I kept trying to find the most perfect, beautiful way to tell you what I want to say. But I couldn't, so you’re hearing it the bad way.”

Chanyeol swallowed visibly.

“I love you, Park Chanyeol,” he said and took a deep breath. “You’re my best friend and I love you. I love spending time with you, I love being silly with you, I love feeling like I’m going crazy whenever I’m with you, but I also love the way you make me feel so happy and protected and safe. I love fighting with you—when they are silly fights, not- not like how these awful weeks have been. And I want to be your best friend forever.”

The taller’s gaze shifted to the ground, but Baekhyun was not done yet.

“That’s why I got so fucking scared when you said that you loved me too. Because then I could no longer hide my feelings. And it meant that I could lose you and that’s fucking scary. Because relationships are not always forever and I don’t want to imagine not having you in my life for a day. I couldn’t bear the thought of risking the friendship we had, even if I wanted more, because I loved it so much too. And so I thought that if I took all these feelings I have for you and shoved them to the furthest part of my heart, then they would go away eventually and I wouldn't have to deal with them. But they only grew bigger and bigger, to the point where it hurt. 

And I tried to fool myself. To take those feelings and pretend they were for someone else when they were not. And I’m sorry. I’m sorry for hurting you. I never wanted that. I’m sorry for being scared. You didn’t deserve that. And honestly, you’re so amazing and literally the best person I know, so I don’t understand why you even like me when I’m _such a mess_ , and I think I might have anger issues?

But I am in love with you. And I want you to know that. I’m _so_ stupidly happy whenever I’m with you and I hope you’re happy when you’re with me too. And I would like to be with you… as more than your best friend… if you still like me…”

“Baekhyun...” Chanyeol said, stepping closer.

“...yes?” 

“Why are you holding a broccoli?”

“Uh…” he looked down at the vegetable on his hand. “Because I thought I had to pair my big romantic speech with a big romantic gesture, but I didn’t have enough time to get flowers and this was all we had at home,” he offered the broccoli, holding it out like a bouquet. “So here you go.” 

“Baekhyun, that’s a broccoli.” 

“Wh— I— You… Why are you being like this?! It’s fucking romantic. Take it— _just_ take it from my hand before I feel stupid.” He wiggled the vegetable in front of him.

Chanyeol laughed and took the broccoli. He looked at it and smiled, before setting it on top of the closed lid of the trash bin.

“Hey…” Baekhyun pouted. But Chanyeol took one final step, closing the distance between them. He cupped Baekhyun’s face with his hands.

“Baekhyun, I don’t _like_ you,” he whispered, his hot breath falling on his lips. Baekhyun tried to not look so defeated, but Chanyeol was speaking again. “I _love_ you.”

And then he finally, _finally_ closed the space between them, pressing his lips against him. Baekhyun’s eyes closed automatically and he kissed back, bringing his arms around the taller’s neck. Relishing in the feeling of Chanyeol’s mouth against him. He kissed nervously and Baekhyun wondered how he managed to live eighteen years of his life when he felt like he just took his _first breath_ ever right now.

He felt so incredibly warm and all he could think was _Chanyeol._ Of his hand cupping his jaw and the other tangling in his hair, pressing him closer. Of his smell as he breathes the same air as him. Of his body flush against him. This was better than whatever he could’ve imagined. Then Chanyeol’s tongue was grazing his and Baekhyun couldn’t help but moan into his mouth.

“ _Fuck.”_ Chanyeol said against his lips but Baekhyun swallowed the words. 

Then he’s being pressed against the body of the trash bin, Chanyeol caging his mouth moving downwards to press open-mouthed kisses on Baekhyun’s neck and little nips that leave shivers in its wake. Everything spins. He felt drunker than he’s ever been in his whole life and all he can do is run his hand on the hair on Chanyeol’s nape and push him closer to him.

“ _Fuck”_ he said again. He has one knee between the smaller’s legs, one hand on his hip to keep him close and the other on the back of his head to hold it as he presses hungry kisses to the column of his neck. “You make me _so crazy,_ you have no idea.”

Baekhyun smiled, pressing a softer kiss to his lips. Feeling a little bolder and moving his lips to suck at the intersection between his jaw and ear. He felt the effect immediately in the way Chanyeol's legs falter for a second. “I think getting one.”

Baekhyun thinks he should feel weird about the sudden upgrade. Chanyeol was just his loyal best friend and right now he is between his legs. But it never felt like a normal friendship anyway. And this, _this,_ he thinks, _feels so right._

He felt a slight tug on his hair that made him moan loudly against Chanyeol’s mouth, which makes the other groan in return, deep and raspy. He felt so incredibly hot. Chanyeol pressed harder into him. He smiled too, his eyes looking like he can’t totally grasp what is happening and Baekhyun can’t blame him when he too feels like he's living a fantasy. He held his face like he’s something precious and the fondness in his gaze makes his heart flutter. He pressed a couple chaste kisses to his lips and then to his cheek.

“You’re still on school property, you know.”

They break apart quickly. They find their friends looking through the fire escape. All of them have knowing smiles on their faces. Sehun has his camera, of course. Jongdae speaks again.

“Not to mention you are _literally_ against a trash bin. Please have some class.”

“How long have you been there?” Baekhyun asks, horrified.

“Long enough” the younger answers. 

Chanyeol groans, pressing a hand to his face, but doesn’t let go of him.

“Please don’t deflower our Baekhyunnie on Prom night. At least not while still in the school” Jongdae sniggers.

“I really hate you all.” Baekhyun says.

They step outside to join them. Kyungsoo and Jongin are holding hands. Yixing runs his hands on his arms, shivering due to the cold.

“Aren’t you guys cold?” he asks.

“Love keeps them warm,” Sehun chimes in again, pressing his hands together and tilting his hand in a mocking endearment, and Baekhyun actually smacks him on the arm this time.

“Brat.” He wasn’t cold until Yixing commented on it, which makes Sehun’s statement _kind of_ true, so it irks him even more. Still, Chanyeol is holding him by the waist and keeping him closer to him, warming him up. He can tell he is just _a little bit_ tight in his pants, so maybe he’s been used as a shield too, but he doesn’t mind.

“I guess everything’s back to normal now,” Jongin says with a shy smile.

“Except that now we’ll have _two_ annoying couples in our group. Can’t wait to be next to the make out sessions in the car when we ride to visit our hyungs,” Sehun whines.

“We’ll make sure to keep you in the middle, don’t worry,” Kyungsoo tells him.

“Guys,” Jongdae intervenes. “Tonight is an historic night. Let’s just be happy and enjoy. It’s been a crazy year.” It’s true, it really has been crazy.

“Historic the day Chanyeol gave every male in school hour-long boners. I don’t know how am I gonna top that next year.”

Chanyeol frowns, confused. “What? That wasn’t me.”

“You were the only one who wasn’t there,” Baekhyun comments, looking at him from his spot in his arms. “I thought you were the one who left the creepy letters.”

“First of all, I only give _cute_ letters,” he declares “Second, I wasn’t even in school at the time. I got there after lunch and then we were discarded.”

Baekhyun squints his eyes at him, trying to figure if he’s lying.

“If it wasn’t you… it had to be one of us. We were the only ones that weren’t affected because we got the letters.”

They all exchange confused stares. Sehun and Yixing looked equally lost, both of them assumed it was the taller too. The silence is almost comical and Baekhyun starts thinking of ways to pester Chanyeol until he breaks down and admits it, that he almost misses the way Kyungsoo and Jongdae look at each other from the corner of their eyes. Jongdae is grinning, but Kyungsoo's poker face falters for just a second when he catches Baekhyun’s eyes.

His eyes widened. It seems like Chanyeol caught it too, because then he is saying in an accusatory tone.

“Mr. Student Body President!”

“No way,” Baekhyun sighs. “I can’t believe it.”  
  


Kyungsoo says nothing, biting his lip and Baekhyun _knows_ he’s been caught because he avoids their stares. Jongdae beside him looks less guilty and only extends his arms and shrugs. The others start to catch up, too.

“Wait, _what?”_

“Are you serious?” 

“How did you even do it?”

Kyungsoo, who’s not wearing his glasses, pinches the bridge of his nose while Jongdae laughs loudly beside him. Chanyeol and Sehun look at them with their mouths agape. Baekhyun just can’t believe it.

“It was all his idea. I just provided the means,” Jongdae says, still smiling.

“What did you use?” 

Jongdae laughs louder. “Good ol’ Viagra.”

“Oh my God.”

“That must have been painful,” Yixing says with a wince. “Thanks for the heads up.”

Everyone laughs together loudly at Yixing’s comment and the absurdity of it all. Chanyeol suddenly stops, getting hit by a thought.

“Wait, I didn’t get any letter…” Chanyeol recalls. 

“Of course not. I was mad at you. I was going to let you fall, you deserved it,” Kyungsoo answers, unbothered.

Chanyeol gapes at him, offended, but can’t really fight back. Everyone laughs again and the tips of his ears redden.

“But Jongin _did_ get it. Were you so cruel to let your boyfriend fall too?” Sehun asks, amused.

“No, I specifically told him _not_ to eat anything and he ignored me,” he shrugs.

“I thought it was a joke,” said boyfriend cries.

“It _was_ a joke… on you,” Sehun finishes and everyone laughs again.

They make it back to the party not long after, and they all dance together to a few songs. Wendy is there with them, looking beautiful in a yellow dress, and Baekhyun makes a mental note to talk to her later and _apologize_ —he was never directly rude to her, but he knows he wasn’t a welcoming presence to her either. Jongdae’s date, Suzy, also joins them for a while after dancing with her friends. Chanyeol keeps giving him loving, unashamed glances and even goes so far as to steal a few kisses. Baekhyun enjoys this moment of them being happy, together and free. It might be the last moment of high school they share together, but it’s certainly a memory he’ll always treasure.

Then, they are being called to gather around the stage as they are about to announce Prom King and Queen. He doesn’t care much for it, but the music stops and he has no other option but to join the crowd. Sehun stands next to him, and he and Chanyeol has a smile on his face.

“I’m really happy for you two, hyung,” he says in Baekhyun’s ear.

“Thank you, Sehun,” he smiles too and after thinking for a moment he speaks again. “Hey, what happened with Yukhei? You didn’t come together?”

“We did talk. He was a bit sad, but he was thankful that we talked about it,” he tells him. “And we’re fine now, so that’s great. And no, we didn’t come together. He actually has a date.”

Baekhyun raises his eyebrows.

“That Thai sophomore, the one with the longest name on this side of the river. They look cute together.”

Baekhyun remembers the guy from the party, the one with lots of piercings. He guesses that now it made sense how he gave Sehun the most menacing look when he got closer to the freshman. “Aw. That’s great for him.”

“Now, the winner for Prom King is… Do Kyungsoo.”

Baekhyun’s head snaps to the stage so hard he gets whiplash. Kyungsoo shoots a glance at Chanyeol who holds his hands up and repeats a mantra that sounds like ‘I didn’t do anything, I swear’. 

Kyungsoo swallows loudly and walks up to the stage and accepts the crown. His eyes are bigger than they’ve ever been as he looks to the crowd. Baekhyun fears this might be a joke— not like he doesn’t believe in his friend, but he’s pretty sure Kim Seokjin was the name he heard the most to win— but then the crowd is cheering loudly, chanting ‘King, King, King’ and there’s even some whistles. Baekhyun is surprised, but joins them nevertheless. Trying to be louder than the rest.

He looks at his friends, and they too, look surprised, but then Jongdae turns to look at them.

“I _might_ have spread around the rumor that he was the mastermind behind the Senior Prank,” Jongdae winks.

Then the host is announcing the girl’s category. Bae Joohyun wins Prom Queen, to no one’s surprise, and the crowd cheers for her as she walks to the stage in her beautiful silver dress and a bright smile to get her crown. She truly looks like a Disney princess, Baekhyun thinks.

A dramatic symphony starts playing, requesting for the King and Queen to do the customary dance. Kyungsoo looks red as he holds Joohyun’s hips, but she smiles encouragingly at him and then they are prancing around like real royalty. The crowd claps around him.

Then, the song turns into a slow ballad. Kyungsoo bows to Joohyun as they part ways and she goes to dance with her actual date, while Kyungsoo reaches Jongin, extending his hand for him to take. Baekhyun watches his friends, enjoying the happiness they share and cooing at the couple.

“Will you dance with me?” A deep voice asks in his ear and he smiles.

“Of course.”

Chanyeol steals another quick kiss from his lips—apparently unable to keep himself from it now that he _actually_ can, but Baekhyun’s not opposed to it— before he places one hand to his hips and his other holds Baekhyun’s much smaller one. Baekhyun puts his free hand on his shoulder, feeling a little nervous because he’s never done this before. He lets Chanyeol lead them on. They sway side to side along with the music. The song is nice and full of feeling. 

“Your bruise is almost gone,” Chanyeol comments after a couple minutes of moving in comfortable silence. His cheek rests against the side of his head, speaking into his ear.

“My mom has been crazy over it, giving me every ointment she could find. She even called my grandma for some home-made recipe.”

The other _hums_ as a response. Then, he feels a soft kiss being pressed into the highest point of his cheekbone, right where the last hues of yellow and green are fading. “Should we tell our parents?”

“About us?”

He feels Chanyeol nodding against his head. 

“No. Let’s enjoy it a little while just ourselves.” He moves back a little to smile at him, a mischievous sparkle in his eyes. “I don’t want to have to leave the door open during sleepovers.”

Chanyeol's face glows red and looks away, but the hand on Baekhyun’s hip presses him closer. He lets go of his hand to wrap his arms around the taller’s neck, and Chanyeol does the same around his waist. 

The music is lulling them. The vocalist sings about falling in love and whatnot and Baekhyun thinks it could not be more fitting, as he rests his head on Chanyeol’s shoulder.

“So…” he feels Chanyeol’s lips move against the shell of his ear, sending shivers down his spine. “Can I call you my boyfriend now?”

Baekhyun bites his lip and raises his head to look at him. He shouldn’t feel so embarrassed after that whole scene they pulled on the back door, but he can’t help the heat that tints his face and chest. “Yeah.”

He leans in and kisses him again. The kiss is sweet and slow, much like the dance. There are no fireworks, but a whole explosion.

\--

Graduation happens in a blink. Almost too quickly, but so does every moment in life.

They’re all gathered in their robes and caps. Baekhyun’s mom cries the whole time and makes them take a hundred pictures, and then Chanyeol’s mom makes them take another round for her own collection. 

Junmyeon and Minseok come all the way from their universities and sit in the guest section, next to Sehun and Jongin—who couldn’t get his GPA up in time, no matter how hard he tried. He’s sad to not be graduating alongside them, but on the bright note he’s happy he’ll do it next to his best friend next year. He cries as he’s prone to do when Kyungsoo gives his valedictorian speech, and Sehun pops _yet another_ party popper when he’s done.

Baekhyun shares nervous glances with Chanyeol. They’re not sitting together due to the alphabetical order, but it’s okay. They’re all together again once they receive their diplomas, and Chanyeol kisses all over his face when he starts tearing up, despite being tears himself too.

Everything happens so fast, that Baekhyun kind of wishes he had a time machine so he could relieve it over and over again. But he only has his memory and that’s good enough.

He thinks that if this were a movie, this would be the grand finale as they throw their hats up in the air.

Everything is fucking great.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so, so, so much to CJ (capitainejaguar on tumblr) and Lizzie (at1stsoo on tumblr and twitter) for helping me beta this fic! They worked so hard and helped me with my mess, I'm incredibly thankful for them.
> 
> I hope you enjoyed this fic as much as I enjoyed writing it! I liked the characters and relationships so much that what was supposed to be a 12k fic ended up being so much more because I just couldn't stop writing.  
> I was inspired by many Romance Comedies and Coming Of Age movies. Pls comment the references you find ;)


End file.
